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January 11, 2025 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 11 January 2025

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Bridgenag

Friday Funnies: While Rome Burns,
Newsom plays a fish

“More wealthy millennials — defined as households of those aged 26 to 45 making more than $200,000 a year — are leaving California than anywhere else in the country, according to a recent SmartAsset report analyzing 2021 and 2022 tax return data. The Golden State lost a net of 9,181 of these wealthy millennial households in that time period, more than double the next biggest loss, which happened in New York. -SF Gate”

https://open.substack.com/pub/rwmalonemd/p/friday-funnies-while-rome-burns?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
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January 11, 2025 8:05am
- Scott
  
  The fires in California appear to show a perfect storm of what happens when you have radical progressive governance.
  
  Newsom is a perfect progressive who embraces DEI, global warming and radical environmentalism.
  
  So a black woman is mayor of LA, a lesbian is LA fire chief and all around are DEI hires in key positions.
  The fire fighters budget has been cut while LA spends money on LGBT initiatives.
  The fires are blamed on global warming by Bernie Sanders.
  
  But California has stopped thinning and managing its forests so there is much more flammable material.
  Water has not been stored because of concerns about the smelt fish. So there is no water in the fire hydrants.
  
  This is what happens when leadership doesn’t really like people, they are concerned only about the trees and the animals, and their main goal is to return the state of California back to the pastoral economy of the 19th century.
  California needs to vote differently. Leftist governance is a disaster all around the world. Wellington is another example.
  Victor David Hanson who lives in California has a great analysis of the situation:
  
  https://www.dailysignal.com/2025/01/09/california-inferno-was-preventable-blame-malfeasance-of-newsom-bass-for-catastrophe/
  
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  January 11, 2025 9:10am
  - thirteenstars
    
    Yep, from X:
    
    This is the LA Fire Department Deputy Chief in the ‘Equity and Human Resources Bureau.’
    
    Kristine Larso, who uses She/Her pronouns, is tasked with helping push DEI in recruitment.
    
    Larso’s promotional video for the LAFD (might need to enable sound):
    
    https://x.com/i/status/1877472146978377747
    
    They’re not even trying to hide their insanity.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:27am
  - gravedodger
    
    Haven’t read the VDH link yet but it is well known that Eucalypts were introduced to California from c1850 and are now an invasive tree species and any one who has seen Australian Bush will understand the fire fuel aspects from that.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:34am
    - Scott
      
      gravedodger – fair comment. It seems that for year California cut back the underbrush and harvested the trees. This helped prevent massive wildfires because the fuel for the fire was limited.
      
      Now California is ruled by environmentalists who want nature to be left alone and really like wilderness and who sue the authorities so that the forests are not managed. Australia may be similar?
      
      These fires are largely the result of radical environmentalism that puts the trees and the animals above the people.
      
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      January 11, 2025 10:41am
      - Don Beckett
        
        When I moved to Wollongong NSW is 1979, during the dryer early spring one could see small fires along the Illawarra escarpment – which were firemen doing controlled burnoffs of scrub & underbrush. In – I think – 1984, the Greens in the NSW Govt. got the practice banned, because it endangered small lizards & other fauna & rare flora.
        In 1988 – the year I returned to NZ, there was a huge bushfire, that ran from Bundeena just south of Sydney, down through Audley National Park and right along the escarpment – past Macquarrie pass & into the Kangaroo valley – massive destruction of bush, fortunately not where some people lived, a small villages in the area were spared. But it was one of the biggest bush fires in that area on record.
        And of course, it was Global Warming //
        
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        January 11, 2025 1:25pm
      - Scott
        
        Don – that’s a great example from Australia. 👍
        
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        January 11, 2025 2:58pm
    - Paulus
      
      Its the natural oil in the Eucaliptus leaves which burn once lighted.
      
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      January 11, 2025 1:46pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    I heard them say they budgeted for fire prevention, for tree thinning, and to get rid of fuel in wooded areas, the person speaking stated they have not spent a cent, typical leftie budget, false budgets making it look good to never be ever used.
    
    We see this very same issue in Aussie with woke state governments like VIC WA and Queensland especially
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:03am
- kowtow
  
  Te media always play the hyperbole .And have no sense for the truth or history.
  
  Worst evah !
  
  1906 , San Fransisco . 3000 dead . 80 % of the city razed .
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:30am
- imalwaysright
  
  Newsome is California’s Trudeau.
  
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  January 11, 2025 12:06pm
Bridgenag

Being COVID “Vaccinated” Doubles Your Risk of COVID Infection
Japanese study confirms findings of other studies, notably the Cleveland Study and a plethora of other data and analyses.

https://open.substack.com/pub/metatron/p/being-covid-vaccinated-doubles-your?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
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January 11, 2025 8:05am
- pdm
  
  `Being COVID “Vaccinated” Doubles Your Risk of COVID Infection………………………….’
  
  Not sure about that Bridgee.
  
  mrspdm and I have had all but one of the vaccinations and have never had covid. I seldom wore a mask (I hate the bloody things) in the period 2020 to 2022 and have mixed with covid infected people, particularly during that period.
  
  The only time we used to take special precautions was when vising our daughter who has cervical cancer and we do that for her not ourselves.
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:41am
  - JackRabbit
    
    N=2 does not translate into meaningful results of safety for 8 Billion.
    
    Taking the precautionary principle into account, if however your two next door neighbours dropped dead on the day of the vaccine, it should be enough to warn you off taking them.
    
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    January 11, 2025 8:42am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    There are so many issues with the cited study.
    
    It is small scale.
    
    Participation is not random.
    
    Results are self reported.
    
    It is run by the Yamato Project who have an agenda against COVID vaccines.
    
    … Japan studies are frequently problematic.
    
    I just don’t get why, nearly four years on, we are getting almost daily anti vaxxer posts on Kiwiblog. Anyway, after a couple of years of posting contrary, large scale evidence on the effectiveness of the vaccines in preventing death, I realise more is a waste of time. It is a bit like arguing with a Jehovas witness who knocks on your door. Then repeating the same argument when he returns the following week.
    
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    January 11, 2025 9:04am
    - Anthony Melchett
      
      When you are forced to do something against your will or face losing your career and your families financial security you tend to remember it and will never stop the search for the truth.
      
      Especially when the thing they made you take injured and hospitalized several of your friends and then didn’t stop you from catching the virus anyway. Maybe it did make you more likely to catch it as most I know caught covid within a month or two of their shots. This wasn’t surprising of course and matched the data already rolling in from other countries. You initially questioned the efficiency of the shots at this point Benedict, but now seem to be back to all in…
      
      You can quote all the studies and statistics you like but the real world outcomes are what they were – terrible.
      
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      January 11, 2025 9:19am
      - Dudley Quaffquaff
        
        How many, exactly, of your friends were injured or hospitalised?
        
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        January 11, 2025 9:36am
      - JackRabbit
        
        Also, proof varies with what you are looking for, and the associated logic.
        
        To prove something is safe, you need to show, for example a 99.99% safety requirement. To do that, you need to show that 9,999 out of 10,000 people were OK. i.e. 1 death. Or 99,990 out of 100,000. 10 deaths.
        
        To prove something is not safe, and therefore less than 99.99% safe, if you get 50 deaths, long before you reach 500,000 sample size, it has already failed. Or 5 deaths long before you reach 50,000 sample size.
        
        Proving that the vaccine prevented deaths is as fraudulent as asking the US government for $100Bn to stop a war in Albania.
        
        “But there was no fighting or anything in Albania.”
        “Your 100Bn was well spent then.”
        
        The vaccines were not tested with double blind studies or control groups, to prove efficacy. But from the time the vaccines were rolled out, those who did NOT get vaccinated, had a far lower incidence of “Covid”/”Covid fatalities or injuries” than those vaccinated.
        
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        January 11, 2025 9:53am
      - pdm
        
        AM – we had our vaccination on after taking advice from our GP.
        
        He has never let us down in over 20 years of having him as our family Doctor.
        
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        January 11, 2025 10:13am
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        PDM – as is your right to do so.
        
        I had my right to make a decision removed by the state under pain of losing my job and being ostrasized by society (I lost friends over even questioning whether one should take the shots).
        
        I think it’s great that your doctor was able to time travel into the future and assure you of any long term side effects of an untested treatment and allow you to make a fully informed decision.
        
        Where the issues lie is that many people observed both the ineffectiveness of the shots – early data from Israel was not good along with their mates having health problems immediately after receiving the shots and then caught covid anyway.
        
        You could understand why people wanted everybody vaccinated after being subjected to a fear campaign but ultimately, the shots didn’t stop you from getting it, it morphed into a mild seasonal cold (as all similar viruses do) and the rate of excess deaths and hugely increased cancer rates can no longer be ignored by those capable of even the slightest amount of thought.
        
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        January 11, 2025 10:41am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Why you people talk this is beyond me, I have never heard of any of my friends who had injuries or hospitalisation, no work colleagues, no close aquatints, no one. Even my mother who had just had a stroke did not have any effects whatsoever, she has had all jabs because she is in the home. She got Covid once and never even had symptoms.
        
        For the record, I am anti the Ardern vaccine forced on us, and people list their jobs because of, I only ever took the first few to allow me to the pub after 7 weeks in the wilderness. I will never take another jab, and I we I’ll flick the bird at anyone saying I am a mug for not getting jabbed. I had Covid once, and I only had a funny voice, no runny nose, not cough, but I will call out this stuff that a huge amount of people were injured
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:13am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        “You can quote all the studies and statistics….”
        
        You are just proving my point. That’s what the fundamentalist Christians say. “You can quote all the studies you like. The earth is 4000 years old.”
        
        Perhaps lobby DPF to ban studies and data. Kiwiblog can be a place solely of beliefs and anecdotes.
        
        Your belief system is equally invalid to those of the 1990s second wave hippies who decided that the MMR vaccine caused autism and that” “natural” immunity was better. 30 years later we know they were mad. Same will be the case for the COVID anti vaxxers.
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:16am
      - JackRabbit
        
        @PDM
        
        From one GP: “We had no way of knowing if the vaccine was safe, so we had to obey the Ministry of Health directives, which stopped us from airing our views based on our understanding, and we were warned if we said anything against the narrative, we would lose our medical license.
        
        From another GP: “We started to see issues with the vaccine early on. If a patient asked “is it safe?” we did not know if they they would “dob us in” if we said no. We had to be careful as we had already received warning letters from the Ministry as result of patient complaints. We would only get into ‘off the record’ conversations with patients we knew had figured out the vaccine was dangerous.”
        
        I had an open conversation with my GP from the very outset, we were on the same page, and I learned of injuries early on from him. Other patients of the same GP, claimed he had said the vaccine was OK. What he actually said was for people to make their own choice based on available information, and if they said they were getting it, he was unable to tell them not to, for fear of being struck off.
        
        Unless GPs did their own research, they simply parroted the “I am the single source of Truth” narrative. 99% of GPs do not do their own research on anything.
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:25am
      - JackRabbit
        
        @Benedict Yu
        
        “You can quote all the studies and statistics….”
        
        Anthony should have said “You can quote all the fake studies and statistics….”
        
        There were no studies or statistics prior to the rollout. The rollout was the study. We were the Guinea Pigs.
        
        Save for the Pfizer OIA ordered by the USA court which revealed:
        
        [1] A high level of deaths, side effects, and miscarriages among the limited testing they did.
        [2] The vaccine did reduce infection.
        [3] The vaccine did not stop transmission.
        
        So, IF you are a researcher, and have a shred of empathy, and concern for your fellow man, you will start searching for that data.
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:41am
      - JackRabbit
        
        @G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Why you people talk this is beyond me, I have never heard of any of my friends who had injuries or hospitalisation, no work colleagues, no close aquatints, no one.
        
        I know people who thinks the same as you, one in particular, whom we will call “Fred”. We have friends in common, some of who have serious vaccine injuries, and confirmed by specialists. One of whom, has heart issues, cannot even get excited or even have an erection, without his heart missing beats or hitting 200 bpm.
        
        But they do not trust “Fred” to talk to him about it, in fact they talk to very few people about it, for fear of being called “conspiracy theorists”.
        
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        January 11, 2025 12:05pm
      - imalwaysright
        
        Dudley
        “How many, exactly, of your friends were injured or hospitalised?”
        
        Maybe that should be How many, exactly, of your friends have been injured or hospitalised so far?
        
        Don’t forget, the undisclosed chemicals are still in most of the populations bodies -no expiry date on the side effects unfortunately .
        
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        January 11, 2025 12:10pm
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        Dudley Quaffquaff
        
        “How many, exactly, of your friends were injured or hospitalised?”
        
        One would be too many, when you extrapolate that across the population.
        
        Is there a number that would get you interested, or are my friends expendable?
        
        Given that I know 5, from a pool of 20 people I know well enough to talk about this with, I hate to think what the real number is. And that’s just immediate issues from the shit, not including everyone with weird health issues currently.
        
        But because you are ok I’m making it up I guess.
        
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        January 11, 2025 2:01pm
    - bennerg
      
      BY, Goebbels articulated the mantra of converting untruth into truth by stating: “Tell a big enough lie, and repeat it often enough, and it becomes the truth.”
      
      Trying to justify the “effectiveness” of the mRNA technology gene therapies redefined as “vaccines”, and casting anyone questioning their benefit as “anti-vax” (against all vaccines), is right out of the Goebbels playbook.
      
      The dictate that they were 100% effective in prevention and stopping transmission slowly got reduced, to where now many professionals now question it’s use in any way.
      
      The lies told about spike proteins remaining at the site of injection is now well proven to be false. And the massive increase in all cause death figures have yet to be explained.
      
      And I’m convinced more will be coming out as the restrictions and censorship of any dissent are abandoned. Come 20th January I’m sure we will see a massive data dump of information come out.
      
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      January 11, 2025 9:30am
      - Mod88
        
        Also Joseph Goebbels
        
        “Think of the press as a great keyboard
        on which the government can play.”
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:25am
      - JackRabbit
        
        The lies told about spike proteins remaining at the site of injection is now well proven to be false.
        
        For some, that did need to be proven to be false. I knew it was false the moment I read it, without the need to see results or investigate. But the big disappointment is that every medical professional should have known that also. So it is worth repeating.
        
        [1] Aside from an erect penis before intercourse, muscles, specifically the thigh leg and upper arm muscles, have the highest blood flow / pressure. Which is why blood pressure is taken from your upper arm.
        
        [2] It gets taught in high school / biology as well as medical school: Blood delivers oxygen to the places that need it most. So the upper arm, and thighs need to replenish oxygen when exercising. So there are squillions arteries and veins in the muscles, capable of very high blood flow. All medical professionals know this.
        
        [3] Everyone who lives in Africa and Australia, know that a poisonous snake bite (and spider bites anywhere), without antidote will paralyze and kill you no matter where it bites, because the poison travels around the body.
        
        [4] 30 seconds of googling our own NZ Health website, and you find that all vaccines are supposed to be injected into the upper arm. And it states the reason for that, is that the muscles have copious arteries and veins, ensure that the vaccine gets distributed around the body!
        
        This gives the degree of conning they did, stating things that were self-evidently false, along with of course the “I am the sole source of truth” from the PM.
        
        Ardern could have told people to strip down to their underwear and hop around the neighbour doing a Monty Python silly walk, and some people would have down it. Mind control.
        
        Almost as daft was putting Teddy Bears in the window and not talking to neighbours because Ardern said so.
        
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        January 11, 2025 3:30pm
    - imalwaysright
      
      “… I realise more is a waste of time. ”
      
      Really? If what you are saying is saving lives then how can it be a waste of time?
      
      Unless, that is, you realise you are wrong and this is your exit plan?
      If you are going to defend/promote a drug then make sure it is safe and effective.
      
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      January 11, 2025 9:37am
    - JackRabbit
      
      … Japan studies are frequently problematic.
      
      Specifics please. A generalised statement is not evidence.
      
      Benedict,
      When people, including me and others, keep saying that they/we/I personally know people that died from the vaccine, or have permanent life shortening injuries, who the frigging hell do you think you are, to insist it’s all bullshit?
      
      You were not there.
      
      You never heard any personal accounts such as:
      “Jim and I work together at XYZ business (well known) in ABC suburb in Woolston. We are both around 35, fit and healthy. I declined the vaccine, which my boss was OK with, as we are not customer facing. Jim left work at 11am Thursday to get vaccinated, and never returned to work. Our boss told us Friday afternoon, that Jim went home because he felt very unwell immediately after the jab. He died in his sleep that night. The funeral is next Friday.”
      
      You were not at their hospital bedside.
      
      You were not in the specialists office when the specialist said: “This is a vaccine injury.”
      
      You were not there in the GP’s office when the GP said: “This is myocarditis, and in the last 18 months since the vaccine rollout, we have had hundreds of patients present with heart issues. I’m taking early retirement.”
      
      You were not present when a vaccinator(s) had a meltdown, after vaccinating an 8 year old, who dropped dead with 12 hours.
      
      You were not at the funerals.
      
      You do not present evidence, just “debunk” anything you don’t like.
      
      You are as belligerent as the JW’s you despise.
      
      Who do you think you are? An all seeing God? I doubt it. An “all seeing God” would have a decent chunk of compassion, which you are not displaying.
      
      It is rude, inhuman, and devoid of compassion to ridicule and poke fun at people suffering or dying.
      
      It is almost comparable to saying that no-one died in WW1 or WW2 and no-one got injuries, and that anyone that has a personal story of relatives that were killed or injured are all conspiracy theorists.
      
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      January 11, 2025 9:38am
      - bennerg
        
        Well put Jack Rabbit. We have a very real and personal impact on lives, and I find it so sad to see individuals parrot the establishment propaganda, as if it makes them feel important and better than others, because they agree with the (paid for) experts, who quite frankly, if they were really honest, know little more than us.
        
        While reasonably educated, I’m not an epidermiologist, or a vaccinologist, but right from the get go my brain told me there was something wrong with the whole mRNA approach. I grew up in the era of Thalidomide, and have observed the medical fraternity since then slowly turn from a caring individual to patient service, to a industrial scale where doctors punch in each morning at a medical centre, and your visits are often never with the same doctor – unless you want to wait 3 weeks!
        
        The medical industry is controlled by the pharmaceutical industry we know as big pharma, all the way from determining how doctors are taught at medical schools, to their on going professional development, subsidisation of their conferences, and control over the medical paper research process. So business controls medicine, and the money it generates controls the political decisions. In the USA the fraternity moves between the industry and the political appointments (who control them) like the tide.
        
        When I saw that doctors expressing an alternate view to the establishment where being silenced and disciplined I knew it had become rotten. The same “paid for” experts, from Ms Wiles, Michael Baker, etc turned up on TV each night. Where was the diversity of opinion? You only get that uniformity of message when there is an invisible force – and hopefully we will start to get a glimpse of that with the second stage of our NZ enquiry into the handling of the pandemic. Not that I personally believe now there was one in the first place. Even the inventor of the PCR test said it was only a research tool, and not a diagnostic test.
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:33am
      - JackRabbit
        
        @bennerg
        
        Thanks.
        
        Even the inventor of the PCR test said it was only a research tool, and not a diagnostic test.
        
        Most people I know who bought the bullshit about the PCR test, thought the PCR test was a laboratory test for Covid.
        
        I’ve had to point out to many:
        
        [1] That the PCR has nothing to do with Covid, but is a method of “amplifying” DNA fragments so that some identification is possible, and a subjective guess made to see if it is Covid.
        
        [2] The FDA requirement for positive identification of any virus, is 100 contiguous (unbroken in the chain) base pair sequences. For Covid they relaxed it to a collection of 4 groups of 25. Since “Covid” has many sequences in common with other viruses, the 25 long sets could come from something else.
        
        [3] Each PCR cycle doubles the sample size, and introduces corruption. At 40 cycles, the sample is magnified over 1 trillion times. Furthermore, because of anti-bodies and cellular memory, trace elements of things that we have been exposed to throughout our life still remain in the body.
        If someone is 60 and they had herpes at 20, it is possible to find traces of herpes at 20, 30 or 40 cycles.
        
        [4] It is relevant to note that the CDC notified it was retiring the PCR test, at the start of August 2021 instead adopting a combined Influenza / Covid 19 test, which would show positive if you had either the flu OR Covid 19, thus allowing Covid theatre to continue, show up positives for Covid that were in fact the flu.
        
        https://www.cdc.gov/locs/2021/08-02-2021-lab-alert-Clarifications_about_Retirement_CDC_2019_Novel_Coronavirus_1.html
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:57am
      - Bridgenag
        
        Thank you
        
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        January 11, 2025 1:29pm
- JackRabbit
  
  Thanks Bridgenag,
  
  The Japanese have been far more vigilant in being open about the damage from the vaccines than the west, including NZ.
  
  A good many NZ people have lost their lives and/or have shortened life spans due to the vaccines. If PDM and his wife are Ok, for now, we should celebrate that, as they probably got one of the less harm test variants. In addition to the three basic batch types, there were dozens of vaccine variants, as the whole world was used as a test lab.
  
  The incidence of excess deaths from cancers has doubled since 2022.
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:59am
- Yvette
  
  Behavioral and Health Outcomes of mRNA COVID-19 Vaccination: A Case-Control Study in Japanese Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises
  Introduction
  … Vaccination campaigns have played a pivotal role in controlling the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and reducing the severity of COVID-19. Messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna have demonstrated high efficacy in preventing symptomatic infection, hospitalization, and death.
  
  Conclusions
  The study observed a higher reported incidence of COVID-19 infection among vaccinated individuals during the pandemic period, which increased with the number of vaccine doses received. This paradoxical finding may be influenced by various factors, including immune response mechanisms, such as antibody-dependen enhancement (ADE) or original antigenic sin, behavioral changes, and exposure risk. Understanding these factors is crucial for urgently enhancing public health strategies and vaccination programs.
  https://assets.cureus.com/uploads/original_article/pdf/313843/20250109-1082254-vnzdp7.pdf
  
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  January 11, 2025 9:18am
  - Yvette
    
    For the downtickers the above quoted article is the same Japanese study which Bridgenag cites Being COVID “Vaccinated” Doubles Your Risk of COVID Infection
    
    “Go figure”, or not
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:13am
    - JackRabbit
      
      “Go do some research” or “drink the koolaid” might be more fitting. 🙂
      
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      January 11, 2025 12:24pm
sungsamning

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2025/01/09/exclusive-mike-waltz-clean-out-deep-staters-from-national-security-council-were-taking-resignations-1201-january-20/
National Security Council Cleanout.
Incoming National Security Advisor Mike Waltz told Breitbart News exclusively that every intelligence official from the various departments and agencies across the federal government currently detailed to the National Security Council (NSC) at the White House under outgoing President Joe Biden will be expected to vacate the premises by 12:01 p.m. Eastern on Inauguration Day when President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated again. [An excellent idea.]
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January 11, 2025 8:09am
- fernglas
  
  So they are basically firing not just the political appointees, but also the “detailees”, who are non-political people detailed to the White House because of their expertise in various security related areas. The detailees will all be replaced with people who are on board with the Trump agenda. In other words, people who are the most qualified for the job will be replaced by those who have the right political views. DEI anybody?
  
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  January 11, 2025 6:40pm
  - Anthony Melchett
    
    Are you saying Bidens minders didn’t appoint their own team 4 years ago?
    
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    January 11, 2025 8:12pm
artemisia

There’s a new book out Character Limit – How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter by Kate Conger and Ryan Mac.

I haven’t read it yet but am waitlisted for it at the library. Meanwhile, I had a go at foretelling the book’s narrative. First hint – the title. Second hint the subtitle. Third hint, the reviews, such as this one – ‘The definitive account of how the world’s richest man, in a fit of unbridled vanity and arrogance, took over and destroyed our digital town square’ John Carreyrou, bestselling author of Bad Blood

But hope springs eternal and some reviews provided a counter balance. How about this one – because disruption is a good thing, right?

Gripping… Through fly-on-the-wall reporting, Character Limit takes readers inside Elon Musk’s tumultuous Twitter takeover and the disruption of a company, an industry, and the online public square. What a wild ride’ Bradley Hope, bestselling author of Billion Dollar Whale

And to round off the positive – an accolade. A Financial Times Best Book of 2024.

X formerly Twitter is a major global player in the social media market so it’s good to get the inside scoop. I do hope I have interpreted the above correctly. Guess I’ll have to read the book to find out. But, dear KB readers, do report back if you get to read it before me.
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January 11, 2025 8:09am
- John Loveridge
  
  Has Twitter/X been destroyed, then? It’s still there. Seems to be quite popular, tweets are everywhere.
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:43am
- Philview
  
  There will be something seriously odd going on in the world if I pick up that book to read. I have never found Twitter interesting and prefer formats like this one to discuss News.
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:51am
  - artemisia
    
    Suspect the book is not really about Twitter.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:37am
sungsamning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olLJ6X6x2zU
On Donald Trumps So-Called “Imperialism”.
One of Trump’s negotiation tactics is the big ask. He says he wants something big. People don’t want to give it up. So they concede something smaller, that Trump really wants. Such as Denmark makes a deal but asks that he does not try to take Greenland. Trump agrees and gets something he really was wanting and the other think they stopped him from getting something else. He did the same with the Abraham Accords.
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January 11, 2025 8:09am
- kglm
  
  The issue with Greenland is about US military security. Perhaps the smaller thing that Trump really wants is a treaty that allows the US to have military bases on Greenland.
  
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  January 11, 2025 9:41am
  - sungsamning
    
    Yes, that could be that. As a territory of Denmark, I assume its in NATO anyway. so there shouldn’t be a problem with stationing more units there. A bit of aid, diverted from Ukraine, or elsewhere might sweeten the pill. I can’t see the point in buying it. The Jones Act would kick in, and make exporting difficult and complicated. Independence would be their best bit. President Trump should dangle a free trade treaty.
    
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    January 11, 2025 2:15pm
  - Paulus
    
    I think there already is some sort of long standing arrangements – what is Sondrestrom Air Base, originally Bluie West-8, it was a United States Air Force base in central Greenland.
    
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    January 11, 2025 2:31pm
  - JackRabbit
    
    kglm,
    
    What about the copious reserves of minerals in Greenland that would provide an alternate source in the event that Trump puts tariffs on China in order to stifle the economic competition, and be locked out of China’s mineral supply?
    
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    January 11, 2025 3:36pm
Cassandra

The good old days: trains were cancelled in England yesterday because drivers refused to walk through 2 inches of snow to get to their trains. Unsafe apparently. Just like microwaves – UK train staff obliged to use a microwave get paid time off for a six-monthly health check, a provision they negotiated in 1980. Before you laugh, note that NZ was like this. In Britain it’s called “the Spanish system”. No wonder Europe is going down the gurgler. Both major NZ parties, years ago, toned down the unions here but like some hibernating virus they’re waiting in the wings. They never really went away in the UkK, despite Maggie’s best efforts.
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January 11, 2025 8:11am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  A six monthly health check is not in itself a bad thing. Particularly for train drivers, who sit on their posteriors all day and, like truck drivers, generally present as well overweight and unhealthy. Just check out the drivers’ area on the freight ferries, not to mention the breakfast options.
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:19am
- igm
  
  Buses in our area are sometimes cancelled because it is too cold for the drivers.
  I wonder if any of these poor petals have ever thought of famers, especially dairy, who must tolerate all conditions 24/7, yet receive daily criticism from their preferred politicians and unionists.
  What the hell is happening to “New Zealand”?
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:32am
  - pdm
    
    Sheep and cattle farmers too igm.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:14am
  - PurplePen
    
    And so public servants should also be able to work in offices with no heating as well.
    
    6 2
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    January 11, 2025 11:16am
    - igm
      
      I doubt many public servants actually work!
      
      9 2
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      January 11, 2025 11:42am
      - PurplePen
        
        They’re all at Princess Bay in wgtn sunny week days as far as I can see.
        
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        January 11, 2025 4:03pm
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        The ones moaning on reddit about being made redundant are classic. You ask them what they actually did at work and they can’t answer!
        
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        January 11, 2025 8:14pm
  - Steve Otto N Shore
    
    New Zealand is being emasculated by DEI women.
    Men turning into wimps.
    
    12 4
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    January 11, 2025 11:23am
    - Morgan H
      
      There’s a big trend around the world where men are being emasculated. Anything that has the slight hint of masculinity is considered toxic by the PC crowd. They want us to be ashamed to being men.
      
      Remember when the Left tried to shame Tony Abbott, a longtime surf lifesaving volunteer, for wearing budgy smugglers? Ironically, that attack actually made him more popular amongst men. Because we are sick of them shaming us for being men.
      
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      January 11, 2025 1:19pm
      - MCōs
        
        Not popular enough
        
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        January 11, 2025 3:08pm
  - Allan
    
    LOL – as a part-time bus driver I can tell you that a lot of buses do not have a heating system.
    
    Travelling down the highway at 90 kph in the middle of winter with the poorly sealed doors blowing directly on to you is not fun.
    
    And on my other days I do cows.
    
    It might be cold but it ain’t blowing a 90 kph gale up my bum.
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:55am
- JackRabbit
  
  …trains were cancelled in England yesterday because drivers refused to walk through 2 inches of snow to get to their trains.
  
  I’m surprised said train drivers are still alive. In winter, if farmers refused to walk through 6 – 18″ of snow to feed stock, there would be no pork, beef, and lamb. I assume that said train drivers don’t eat for 4 months of the year in solidarity with farmers.
  
  And I am pretty, if we had a ‘sneaky cam’ I’m sure there would be videos of that said train drivers taking their young children out in much deeper snow to play.
  
  Unions: Milking UK employers since 1867.
  
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  January 11, 2025 8:51am
  - Steve Otto N Shore
    
    Deep snow is not dangerous like 2 inches of snow.//
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:25am
    - JackRabbit
      
      Yeah, who doesn’t like a bit of snow. Perhaps they were suffering from “snow envy”, and needed 6 inches or more to feel manly.
      
      Spectacular footage Train plowing through deep snow Arthurs Pass
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6acPX_00M9Q
      
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      January 11, 2025 11:32am
      - Steve Otto N Shore
        
        I remember that. I have also seen videos of the same in Alaska.
        3 engines are banked so they clear the track for freight and the Denali Star.
        Everything in America is big and their engines are no exception. Huge.
        Arthur’s Pass is the same. Clearing for freight and the Transalpine.
        
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        January 11, 2025 12:21pm
  - slijmbal
    
    @JackRabbit
    “Unions: Milking UK employers since 1867.”
    
    A little unfair. The Working Class were poorly treated until unions came along. Unions did a stunning job for many decades and there were significant advances in employee treatment ranging from employers having to actually care about employee safety and improvements in pay.
    
    Sadly, they lost the plot in the 70s in the UK culminating in the “Winter of discontent” (where I grew up as a baby boomer) much of it influenced by communism. Most of my extended family were factory workers and used to complain about the union stewards being little dictators who named everybody brother or comrade and called ludicrous strikes.
    
    If you look at the UK post the GFC. The return on labour has majorly lagged the return on capital and it shows. One likely contributor was cheap labour with getting towards 2 million Poles and Romanians willing to take low wages courtesy of the EU.
    
    Was back in blighty a few months ago and they’re finally starting to see some rebound for lower paid workers after Brexit. The type of ludicrous union behaviour mentioned here tends to be in government or ex-government industries. Outside of that workers’ treatment has been moving closer to the US model over the last 40 years.
    
    They also have the same ludicrous problems with some key unions being too political like here. For instance, nurses and teachers are exceedingly poorly served by their unions as they’re too busy being an arm of Labour rather than representing their members.
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:57am
    - Kaiser Wilhelm
      
      The PPTA is a far-left madhouse, infested with rabid intersectional ideology.
      
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      January 11, 2025 1:13pm
Chuck Bird

This is very important, particularly for farmers to attend, but also for anyone who does not want our taxes to pay billions for our emissions, which will disappear somewhere and will not help reduce global warming.

State of the Nation ’25

https://www.act.org.nz/stateofthenation-2025?utm_campaign=100125_sotn_members&utm_medium=email&utm_source=actnz
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January 11, 2025 8:24am
Chuck Bird

Micheal Venus will be playing in the doubles finals at 11:15 this morning. It would be great if he and his partner win.
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January 11, 2025 8:55am
- Chuck Bird
  
  Sorry 1:45 PM.
  
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  January 11, 2025 11:35am
  - Chuck Bird
    
    Venus got the title due to other player pulling out due to injury.
    
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    January 11, 2025 2:34pm
Tomtoddy

Now here’s a funny thing. Come to roadworks that close one side of the road using traffic lights and lying in the grass at both ends you will find a person dedicated to your safe passage through the affected area. Another “safety” measure.

Useless, expensive and a further cost to the taxpayer. Like renting road cones.
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January 11, 2025 8:59am
Anthony Melchett

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/kahu/racial-abuse-and-assault-claims-mar-family-outing-at-cable-bay/F4WTIONABBHN7KOIRAZSETUNLY/

I feel like we are missing half the story here.

It’s just too perfect for this to have happened to a woke virtue signalling councilor and the story ticks every single buzz word.

In fact, i don’t think it happened at all…
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January 11, 2025 9:03am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I believe it.
  
  Some dog owners are very entitled folk.
  
  One of my kiddies was bowled over by a large dog bounding along a beach. The owners assured me that their doggie wouldn’t harm a fly… I told them to look at my upset toddler who’d just been charged at by an out- of- control hound.
  They just walked away…. no apology.
  
  I was bitten on the hand (not badly) by a dog on a lead as the owner & dog passed me on a footpath.
  When I yelped, the owner said it was my fault for swinging my hand down by my thigh (where it usually moves when I walk along ).
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:08am
  - kowtow
    
    Couldn’t agree more re entitled and actually dangerous dog owners .( many from the “nice” , “better” class of folk).
    
    Always someone else’s fault.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:34am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    My favourite. You are walking along and a crazed looking, large dog races towards you. The owner yells out from 50 metres away “Don’t worry he is friendly”. 🙄
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:36am
    - lifesgood
      
      I bloody hate dogs. Sorry to all the dog addicted people on here but it seems things have got seriously out of control. I mean nobody seems to have just one dog these days, they seem to have 2 or 3 and they put their dogs way above people. I have just been to the beach on Waiheke with my two grand children toddlers, They were happily playing on the sand and making sand castles when some entitled person’s dog came and weed all over it. Owner just laughed. Disgusting! And nobody seems to take notice of the times dogs are allowed on beaches anyway they just take them, off leash, at any time of the day.
      
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      January 11, 2025 12:44pm
  - PurplePen
    
    Other people’s dogs or pets like other people’s children … benefit no-one in public except their respective guardians.
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:19am
    - MCōs
      
      Unlike dogs kids grow up and keep the country ticked over.
      
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      January 11, 2025 3:20pm
      - PurplePen
        
        Agree .. I’m always of the opinion, keep them to yourself until they can make conversation and pay tax. Otherwise I don’t want to see nor hear other people’s children.
        
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        January 11, 2025 4:08pm
- DimChappie
  
  Anthony, I was very suspicious about the detailed quotes like “fat oompaloompa Maori bitch” and the reference to Ngati Kahu. They seemed too detailed but it seems Jones was recording it on his phone. Maybe they were taunting her. I agree it seems unreal but there has been an arrest. Now we can expect the MSM to do in depth reporting about the Masterton flag incident where a whitey was attacked by hikoi members for waving the NZ flag! Police just watched then arrested him. //
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:08am
- David Garrett
  
  Anthony: The story mentions video of part of the incident. Also the woman has been charged. I don’t believe we have quite got to the point in NZ where the police charge people in the absence of any evidence.
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:14am
  - Anthony Melchett
    
    You don’t think its too perfect that a guy described as a Maori tech innovator is “attacked” by what is described as a 63 year old “pakeha” woman?
    
    It’s a fake article designed to create division and an opportunity to group people by race.
    
    No 63 year old woman picks a fight with a group of maoris. That ends in a beating or a stabbing.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:52am
    - Ghost
      
      Right so all Maori are violent are they? It’s not a fake article.
      
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      January 11, 2025 10:57am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        No, but it appears the ones that do not pander to their race are not violent, but it looks like these activists Māori are the violent ones
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:17am
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        Were you there to witness it?
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:45am
      - Ghost
        
        You weren’t. What we know is that a family were out for a day at the bench, the husband recorded the incident, the police charged the woman. Stop creating your fantasy of what happened
        
        And answer the question, do you think all Maori are violent?
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:48am
      - Paulus
        
        Historically Maori genes purport towards the way they have continually developed to violence still.
        Only some 150 odd year ago canibalism existed.
        Until Maori accept that they are no longer pure Maori will then the continuation towards violence be registered – look at the Prison population.
        Lovely tribal blokes still.
        
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        January 11, 2025 1:56pm
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        Ghost
        
        “… and answer the question, do you think all Maori are violent?”
        
        Statistically yes, Maori commit more crimes of violence both against themselves and other races. Facts are facts. Of course not every Maori is violent but are you stupid enough to go up to a family of maoris and call one a fat oompaloompa bitch? It simply didn’t happen.
        
        You don’t get out much do you?
        
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        January 11, 2025 2:11pm
      - Ghost
        
        I get out a lot, and rarely, thankfully, come across racists idiots. Stop the victim blaming and stop the racism. This is a family with kids out for a day. It’s truly sad there are still people like you who want to twist this around to make them the aggressors instead of the victims of this woman
        
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        January 11, 2025 4:02pm
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        It’s not racist to state the facts. If you go up to any Maori family and call one of them a fat oompaloompa bitch, your getting smacked 9 out of 10 times. It’s just the way it will play out, maybe you could try it and report back to us?
        
        It is however racist to refer negatively towards the alleged attacker as a pakeha.
        
        Maybe you could also ask some maoris what they think of Chinese and Indian people. That might open your eyes as to who are the racists here.
        
        Lets be clear rhough ghost, im not victim blaming, I’m saying it didn’t didn’t happen and if it did, it’s a very different version of events to what the councilor is claiming.
        
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        January 11, 2025 8:33pm
      - Ghost
        
        Well if you are stupid to walk up yo anyone and call them a fat bitch you deserve what you get. And no, most people would send your sorry bitt to the ground for saying that, not just Maori, but thanks for showing your racism again.
        
        And yes when you claim this didn’t happen, despite the man having video evidence, despite the police charging the woman, you are victim blamming.
        
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        January 11, 2025 8:55pm
    - David Garrett
      
      Anthony: Have you actually read the story? The “group of Maoris” was the man’s family, and the woman was charged with common assault, which can be no more than spitting on someone.
      
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      January 11, 2025 11:28am
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        Of course I read it.
        
        Look at the guy the article focuses on and just look a little deeper…
        
        If its not completely fake it’s something blown completely out of proportion by a guy wanting people to look at him and take on his narrative.
        
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        January 11, 2025 11:50am
    - imalwaysright
      
      There were three babies in the photo, playing frisbee with a dog near them is an accident waiting to happen. She should have gone further away.
      
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      January 11, 2025 12:56pm
  - David Garrett
    
    …actually I should amend that comment to say that other than in cases of alleged domestic violence – in which no corroborating evidence is now required to justify an arrest – we have not yet got to the point where police arrest people without any evidence of a crime having been committed.
    
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    January 11, 2025 10:54am
- AitchW
  
  The language in the article is very emotive, very sympathetic to the complainant.
  The family was “enjoying a lovely day at the beach before it was rudely interrupted”.
  Not a lot of journalistic objectivity.
  Sympathy for the usual people again.
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:38am
  - MCōs
    
    That’s right
    Sympathy for the family at the beach having to put up with the boorish behaviour of someone with a chip on her shoulder
    She made the mistake of picking on someone a lot smarter than she was who knew how to handle the police and media because that’s what he does.
    
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    January 11, 2025 3:46pm
surfing

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/anz-australias-new-zealand-dollar-to-australian-dollar-exchange-rate-shocks-kiwi-family/2IFBWIQBIFDJDN4OAL2RCCK5F4/

Guy transfers $780,000 to Australian bank account at the banks advertised exchange rate, which is always awful.

I always negotiate with the bank for transfers in the thousands. Advertised rates are for people who want $500 for their holiday or similar.

Bank onine systems are crappy though, I always had to talk to someone in their fx dealing team.

Really the bank should have talked to this guy , no one sends such large amounts at the retail rates. Obviously a newbie.
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January 11, 2025 9:05am
- mogg
  
  XE transfers regulated by the NZFMA and in Australia. Online quotes and money tracking available. All trading banks will rip you off, some more than others.
  
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  January 11, 2025 3:03pm
Maggy Wassilieff

All Climate emission funds seem to flow into unaccountable sinks

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/41-billion-world-bank-climate-finance-unaccounted-oxfam-finds
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January 11, 2025 9:20am
- G152
  
  Meanwhile the Sun warms us
  
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  January 11, 2025 9:56am
- imalwaysright
  
  Article:
  “nearly 40 percent of all climate funds disbursed by the Bank over the past seven years— is unaccounted for due to poor record-keeping practices”
  
  Unless the bank is receiving the money in cash in shopping bags and paying it out the same way then there will be electronic records.
  
  Or maybe “poor record-keeping practices” is the new euphemism for “we’ve stolen it and deleted the evidence”.
  
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  January 11, 2025 9:59am
- JackRabbit
  
  I’m sure Bernie Madoff had unaccountable sinks as well. Most frauds do.
  
  Climate Emission funds are a fraud on an unprecedented scale, so it makes sense the funds disappear down a black hole.
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:03am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Perhaps Oxfam are miffed that they did not get their share.
  
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  January 11, 2025 1:59pm
Yvette

Consideration of a Pan-Maori Te Whare o te Rangatiratanga
A hui for Ngāti Kahungunu to discuss the idea on Thursday was fiery, with hapū representatives saying there had been inadequate consultation. That theme was picked up on Friday and not just by local Māori.
Green Party MP Hūhana Lyndon, of Northland’s Ngātiwai iwi, said more engagement with Māori communities across the motu was needed before iwi leaders seriously considered the proposal.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/01/10/rough-start-for-proposal-for-unified-maori-deliberative-body/

Ngāti Kahungunu Chair Bayden Barber said today’s hui was an opportunity to set the stage for Māori ahead of events later this month at Rātana and Waitangi.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/538594/three-hundred-leaders-gather-plan-pan-maori-assembly-to-challenge-government.

Wasn’t working under considerable pressure to comply with a February 6 deadline, a major flaw in the original Waitangi-delivered document?
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January 11, 2025 9:25am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I wonder why the Maori Leaders have decided that the NZ Maori Council or the National Iwi Chairs Forum are no longer the bodies to take their concerns to Parliament.
  
  Can 3 organisations do the job of one?
  
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  January 11, 2025 9:45am
  - PurplePen
    
    The way MSM report about this initiative is if it’s new. Why didn’t they ask the same question you’ve posed or certainly ask it of Lyndon.
    
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    January 11, 2025 11:24am
  - kowtow
    
    ‘are no longer the bodies to take their concerns to Parliament.’
    
    Funny , the whole point of individual voters actually going to the trouble of electing an MP was having someone who actually ‘represented” the voters concerns and allegedly all his constituents’.
    
    Why these raqce based organisations think otherwise is beyond me .
    
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    January 11, 2025 12:35pm
    - PurplePen
      
      There’s all manner of lobby groups such as for women, children, any number of ethnic groups, LGB, disabled, aged, some better organised that others. Some even have their own government agency. I note I’ve never come across one for the waist circumference or gravity challenged. It’s the last remaining human characteristic that you’re still allowed to discriminate against.
      
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      January 11, 2025 4:14pm
- pdm
  
  I would not have too much confidence in, or give too much credence to Bayden Barber.
  
  My gut feeling is that he is an opportunist who aspires to be the John Tamihere of Hawkes Bay and maybe even the whole East Coast of the North Island.
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:43am
  - Yvette
    
    Pdm, you may be right …
    Rough start for proposal for unified Māori deliberative body
    Few iwi leaders turned up to a hui in Hawkes Bay to discuss a new deliberative body for Māori which would resist Government policies
    
    Speaking to Newsroom after the hui, Modlik said he remained optimistic the proposal could be adopted and implemented this year.
    “I’m optimistic about it for two reasons. One is the imperative. Nothing has changed in terms of the imperative for our people to have a voice that can authoritatively speak to the kāwanatanga. All of the catalysts for the proposal arising during 2024 are all there and my expectation is that 2025 is likely to see a further reinforcing of the need for that,” he said.
    “Secondly, I think what we will see over the course of ’25 is a clarifying of the concept. As our communities engage progressively around the motu and people are familiarised with it, we will see a speeding up of the dialogue so that we’ll actually be able to crystallise something before the end of the year.”
    https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/01/10/rough-start-for-proposal-for-unified-maori-deliberative-body/
    
    So Luxon need not change his Waitangi Day plans
    
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    January 11, 2025 12:00pm
    - Paulus
      
      With so many Tribes and Iwi Maori can never be united, as have been proven over the last 160 years – nor ever will.
      All Maori are equal, but many are not unless they have their family in the right place, being more equal than others.
      
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      January 11, 2025 2:03pm
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    I don’t think Bayden Barber is anything like John Tamihere.
    
    https://sites.google.com/site/baydenbarber/philosophy
    
    5 0
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    January 11, 2025 12:45pm
- Morgan H
  
  There are so many voices for Maori, it doesn’t make sense to keep the Maori seats. Even some on the Left agree MMP means we don’t need Maori seats anymore.
  
  11 2
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  January 11, 2025 12:02pm
  - PurplePen
    
    I’ve said it a few times in here. They were recommended by the Royal Commission in 1985 that they should be abolished along with the recommended MMP.
    
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    January 11, 2025 4:17pm
Swifty

A lefty tactic now all around the Western world – speak against us and we’ll label you ‘far-right’, we don’t care who you are or how inoffensive your point is, we’ll do our best to equate you with Adolf Hitler and his excesses.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sc0CNzr5St0

This tactic is vile and they should stop doing it.
14 0
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January 11, 2025 9:37am
vand

Sri Lankan Buddhist jailed for 9 months for insulting Islam. Of course the “insults”
are not listed.
We dodged a bullet with the coalition govt that doesn’t favour criminalising “hate speech “ but Islamists will still push for it with Labour /Greens
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ce8jdy8j41lo
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January 11, 2025 10:08am
- MCōs
  
  In Thailand people have been jailed for ten years plus for insulting the monarchy, fifty years in one case.
  The trials are secret and there’s no appeal. Anyone can make the accusation and the offence could have occurred ten years ago. A good way to get rid of a political opponent
  When the previous king died some people were chased by mobs in central Bangkok for not wearing the appropriate clothing
  
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  January 11, 2025 11:43am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Presumably you’re in favour of free speech then, MCoS?
    
    3 0
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    January 11, 2025 2:01pm
Tauhei Notts

My local farmers and businessmen’s club is getting rid of their six pokies.
The compliance costs have steadily risen to an uneconomic level.
I think this is just another example of compliance costs in our country becoming unsustainable.
16 1
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January 11, 2025 10:17am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  TBH, pokies are a blight on society. It’s a good thing that they’re going.
  
  9 3
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  January 11, 2025 2:02pm
Benedict Yu

This is a DEI video from the LA fire department.

https://mustreadalaska.com/los-angeles-fire-dept-dei-video-thats-rocking-the-world-short-version-need-rescuing-its-your-fault/

Apparently black folk want to be rescued by firefighters who “look like them”. Also women like to have their house fires extinguished by women firefighters. Carrying people out of burning buildings is not part of the job description.

On the same theme, the Maryland State Police have been successfully sued by the US Justice Department. This is because the fitness test for new police recruits discriminated against black people and women. Black people are disproportionately over weight. Women are not as strong or as fast as men.

https://www.wbaltv.com/article/maryland-state-police-agree-27-million-settlement-civil-rights-lawsuit/63381102#:~:text=The%20Maryland%20State%20Police%20have,a%20certain%20written%20test%20to

This is all very amusing until a guy dies in a burning house because the firefighters are not able to carry him to safety.
22 2
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January 11, 2025 10:28am
- pdm
  
  There has been a comic strip type joke on facebook over the last few months that goes something like this.
  
  Fireman enters burning room and sees woman standing across room.
  He says – hang on lady I will be there in a second to save you.
  Woman says I identify as a man.
  Fireman turns and yells behind him – room clear.
  Final picture shows dead body on room floor.
  
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  January 11, 2025 10:57am
- sungsamning
  
  I guess LA is no longer carbon neutral.
  
  7 1
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  January 11, 2025 2:26pm
- kevn
  
  BY… I missed the bit where firemen needed to be jabbed in order to save lives.
  Must have been edited out.
  Hundreds of LA (and other areas) firemen were told to go for refusing the jab mandate.
  
  9 1
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  January 11, 2025 2:32pm
MCōs

President Carter’s funeral
https://x.com/talbertswan/status/1877594559321972807?s=46&t=XZLqGbhN-xeYzprhTaktsg
5 1
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January 11, 2025 11:31am
- Steve Otto N Shore
  
  That voiceover was quite amusing.
  
  4 2
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  January 11, 2025 12:03pm
- kevn
  
  mcos… Maggie Pie always said you should get into twitter/X.
  
  6 0
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  January 11, 2025 2:27pm
Steve Otto N Shore

Another short video from Julian Batchelor.
“If I Wanted NZ To Fail, This Is What I Would Do”
I remember this from 2023.
I wonder if people are really looking at what is happening in New Zealand.

Video 9 minutes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHJxmy-JSNI
10 2
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January 11, 2025 11:50am
- Steve Otto N Shore
  
  The website referred to is worth a look at.
  
  7 3
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  January 11, 2025 11:59am
Morgan H

Quite a few of us have a problem with Luxon as leader due to his wokeness. If you could choose anyone currently in parliament to lead National, who would you choose?

My choice would be Judith Collins.
7 12
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January 11, 2025 11:59am
- Steve Otto N Shore
  
  Simeon Brown. Very clever man.
  
  18 2
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  January 11, 2025 12:27pm
  - Morgan H
    
    Yeah, he’s a good choice. An actual conservative who doesn’t bow to woke causes.
    
    15 0
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    January 11, 2025 12:35pm
  - imalwaysright
    
    Agreed. He was a bit nervous to start with, but he is a fast learner and a clear thinker.
    He also has courage.
    
    15 2
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    January 11, 2025 1:09pm
    - JamesSamuel
      
      The Nats have some good people. Brown is one and Erica Stanford another. James Meager is also one to keep an eye on. What is Luxon’s problem though? I think it’s that dreadful eagerness to please all the time. I believe he’s a genuinely pleasant man but being nice doesn’t always cut the mustard. I sometimes just long for him to dredge up some judicious deployment of invective occasionally.
      
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      January 11, 2025 2:21pm
      - Morgan H
        
        I agree with you except for the James Meager comment. People are pushing him as the next big thing over nothing. One speech and the MSM are calling him the next prime minister.
        
        3 1
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        January 11, 2025 4:40pm
  - PurplePen
    
    And not bad on the eye .. not that that’s a valid criteria really.
    
    1 2
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    January 11, 2025 4:19pm
- Kaiser Wilhelm
  
  She had her chance and failed.
  
  13 1
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  January 11, 2025 1:17pm
  - Morgan H
    
    She was sabotaged by the woke faction of National.
    
    6 6
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    January 11, 2025 1:22pm
    - MCōs
      
      Maybe she was just prompted beyond her competence
      
      6 4
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      January 11, 2025 1:43pm
  - lifesgood
    
    The utterly cowardly and pathetic way she got rid of Simon Bridges is something I will never forgive her for. She showed her true colours there.
    
    12 1
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    January 11, 2025 2:43pm
- MCōs
  
  National will stick with the current leadership team for the meantime unless they lose the next election, which would be catastrophic for them.
  I don’t recall a two term National government let alone a single term one.
  The idea of Collins becoming leader again is laughable.
  
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  January 11, 2025 1:36pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    There has never been a one term, usually 3 one x 4, I think there may have been 2 terms going right back
    
    2 0
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    January 11, 2025 5:40pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  Look, unless Luxon resigns which is possible, they won’t replace him. What in the
  Hell would the point of bring Collin’s in? She was a complete and total failure when she had her chance . centrist voters see her as toxic, she has no chance, can you not remember the vulgarity of the way she treated Bridges, people do not forget that crap
  
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  January 11, 2025 2:21pm
  - Morgan H
    
    The type of people who support Luxon’s National are the people who would support National no matter what. Judith Collins might be polarising, but at least she stands for something. What does Luxon stand for?
    
    3 3
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    January 11, 2025 4:45pm
    - Ghost
      
      And yet as national party leader she was very weak. Not the Judith that she used to be. She is not leader material
      
      6 1
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      January 11, 2025 4:47pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      What does she stand for, she could not tell us in 2020, many life time Nats voters I know simply didn’t, whine away as much as you like, it’s not the fact Nat voters e we I’ll vote her or not, it’s guaranteed if she became leader, then. As would lose the centre, the only way to win a MMP election is command the centre, ( the swing voters)
      
      2 1
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      January 11, 2025 5:45pm
      - Morgan H
        
        Who was the centrist party at the last election? Every party besides Labour increased their vote. Minor parties like the Greens, Act and the Maori party won more electorate seats than usual.
        
        The “elections are won in the centre” is a lie used to excuse politicians who don’t stand for anything.
        
        2 2
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        January 11, 2025 7:27pm
G the giant from Dunedin

What do people think about the arrogance of Hipkins words for 2026. He wants people to stop and think are they better off Behahahahaga, he’s such a deluded moron, how could a middle income family with 2 kids or more not be better off, inflation back to 2%, interest rates dropping 9 months earlier than predicted, stolen taxes returned ( min wage full time would now be at the 30cent threshold) and child care money for families. What the tell does this fool think the answer is?

This could well be a good post to put up on the blog.
11 3
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January 11, 2025 1:22pm
- Don Beckett
  
  Please explain “Behahahahaga”. 🙁
  
  9 1
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  January 11, 2025 1:50pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Belly laughs
    
    4 1
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    January 11, 2025 2:22pm
    - JackRabbit
      
      No socialist is capable of a really good uninhibited belly laugh because it requires real humour, and lack of inhibitions and baggage.
      
      What you heard was reflux flatulence from sausage rolls and having to stomach losing the election.
      
      5 1
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      January 11, 2025 3:45pm
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        They were my belly laughs
        
        3 0
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        January 11, 2025 5:46pm
Chuck Bird

I do not know Bruce Willis but now he has started this petition to Parliament let us all help get people to sign it.

Petition of Bruce Willis: Remove Māori electorates

https://petitions.parliament.nz/d61fab3d-3766-4343-c409-08dd17f0dfb0
10 2
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January 11, 2025 2:15pm
- sungsamning
  
  I just signed it. Thanks for the link.
  
  9 0
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  January 11, 2025 2:30pm
- PurplePen
  
  Have signed. Ta. Rationale provided for the petition is sound.
  
  6 0
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  January 11, 2025 4:23pm
Steve Otto N Shore

Candace Owens.
This came up on my Facebook. Many do not like Candace Owens and for some reason her name triggers them. I do happen to like her and I follow her on FB.

Anyway, the video is titled “I Got A Legal Threat From A Sitting President… | Candace Ep 130” I will not say who at this stage, but these so called rumours have been around for years.

Video is 34 minutes. Something to watch in a respectable 18 degrees inside, with a beer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJtAUKgkqc0
5 3
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January 11, 2025 2:58pm
NothingLeft

Interesting list of 2020 US election anomalies in the battle ground states:
https://www.worldtribune.com/greatest-hits-17-trump-releases-documentation-of-election-fraud-in-2020-swing-states/
5 1
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January 11, 2025 4:55pm
Swifty

Has the pendulum begun to swing back?

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/538694/meta-ends-diversity-and-inclusion-programmes-zuckerberg-blasts-biden

The signs are promising.
6 0
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January 11, 2025 6:33pm
- Steve Otto N Shore
  
  What’s with his hair?
  Emasculated so he does not look DEI?
  
  2 3
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  January 11, 2025 7:20pm
cmm

It was interesting watching an interview with Mel Gibson on Fox.

His house was burned down, but that is hardly interesting in itself.

He says that a month or two ago they had another fire – that time without the winds – and it got to within 200 metres of his house.

You would think that these people would understand the danger of fires and all have go-bags ready etc. It is absolutely astounding that it caught them all so flat footed.

Everyone has been warning this would come. Heck, even the insurance companies were pulling back – and where they hadn’t the insurance premiums were through the roof. Clearly the writing was on the wall.
5 1
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January 11, 2025 8:47pm

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