About
Contact
Advertise

Facebook
Twitter

January 30, 2025 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 30 January 2025

Like this:

Like Loading...

Email
Facebook
Twitter
Comment369

Uncategorized
General Debate

Comments (369)

Login to comment or vote

Scott

Today is a happy day because I’m heading south from Masterton to Wellington. The reason for my happiness is that I can now drive from Masterton to Featherston at 100km/hr! Today is the day we can drive the wide and straight Featherston highway at open road speeds instead of the 80km imposed on us by the previous Labour govt.

Why is this a big deal? For me it’s a microcosm of left wing governance. Of the previous government’s desire to control everyone and everything –
– We can beat covid by confining you to your homes for years.
– Wear a mask.
– Don’t talk to your neighbour.
– Get the Vax.
– Now go and get it again.
– And if you do maybe we’ll let you out to get a coffee at the local cafe?
– But only if you show your pass mind!

We’ll unilaterally stop all oil and gas exploration. And we’ll stop you driving in your cars at open road speeds. Almost every road will be under repair, for years in some cases, and you can never ever enjoy the speed and freedom of the open road again.

We the voter must never forget. Behind the smiling faces and the placid talk about “kindness” beats the hearts of a cabal of socialist control freaks.

But enough of gloom and despair. I’m about to get out the SUV, put the gear lever into “sport” and blast down the road to Featherston. And I’ll enjoy every minute of it. 😊
68 2
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:02am
- Steve Otto N Shore
  
  “Don’t talk to your neighbour” is one of the dumbest things I ever heard the socialist control freak Ardern ever say.
  
  56 3
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:29am
  - MCōs
    
    Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
    Of course she never said that that I recall, because I most certainly talked to my neighbours around here
    
    2 46
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:45am
    - Steve Otto N Shore
      
      She did say it. Watch videos of Arden spouting bullshit from the podium of truth.
      I will find it later, I have a job to go and do right now.
      If she had have caught you talking to your neighbour when she said not to, she would have Cuddles Coster put you in jail!
      
      38 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:04am
      - NZer In Exile
        
        Her big tech comrades appear to have perma-deleted some of her most embarrassing moments .
        
        7 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 7:56pm
    - Flossie
      
      She absolutely did say it.
      
      40 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:27am
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      Yep, She said “don’t talk to your neighbours, keep to your bubble”.
      
      I saw it, and was stunned, as it is absolutely contrary to how you should behave in any emergency.
      
      Ardern was mocked on a USA TV station for using those words.
      
      https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350520467/fox-news-who-mocked-jacinda-ardern-slams-nz-and-australia-s-covid-19-response
      
      37 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:54am
    - John Loveridge
      
      She absolutely did say it. I remember staring at the telly in disbelief. Then I went straight outside to discuss the matter with my neighbour.
      
      32 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:36am
    - ISeeRed
      
      So Mcos, what do you have to say?
      
      15 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:40pm
      - Tom Hunter
        
        He’ll move on to defending something else about the “Centre-Left”.
        
        9 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 4:25pm
    - Steve Otto N Shore
      
      I said I would come back.
      “Don’t talk to your neighbours”
      This must be done using AI, right?
      Try 49 seconds in MCos. She did not say that right?
      
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3sPZ5j4PIo
      
      11 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 4:39pm
  - mogg
    
    I am sure they set up a hotline to ‘dob your neighbour in’.
    
    29 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:51am
    - kowtow
      
      I believe the police recruits at the police college were put on the Dob In Your Fellow Citizen lines , while they twiddled their thumbs under lock (gulag) down.
      
      12 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:29pm
  - JackRabbit
    
    “Don’t talk to your neighbour” is one of the dumbest things I ever heard the socialist control freak Ardern ever say.
    
    It was not dumb – it was narcissistic calculation. Ardern didn’t want neighbours talking and sharing concerns about orchestrated mad hatter’s pandemic response, or about the toxicity of the vaccines.
    
    She had already muzzled doctors, health professionals, pharmacies, and alternate health providers, had Facebook and Google A.I. remove all contrary narratives.
    
    Locking us down meant you couldn’t go have private conversations. So stopping neighbours talking was the last hole to plug. From there it was the “one source of truth”, more fitting of the Borg in Star Trek, the Cybermen in Dr Who, or Invasion of Body Snatchers.
    
    Invasion of the Body Snatchers is probably the closest comparison. Once someone was injected (snatched), they would point out anyone unvaccinated (unsnatched) and scream an alarm, just like Benedict keeps doing.
    
    And society was divided into the snatched and unsnatched. There does appear to be a change in some of the snatched, in that they no longer can talk openly and debate being about being snatched.
    
    Some research I have read indicates that the mRNA vaccine as part of modifying DNA, appears to have a defense mechanism built in to avoid detection and removal, much like the behaviour of heavy parasitical infections, which is well documented in both humans, esp children, and pets.
    
    16 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:11pm
    - imalwaysright
      
      Jackrabbit,
      I know you are using the term “she” out of convenience, bearing in mind that she would struggle to organise an Uber, let alone the suspension of the operation of an entire country.
      It would be interesting to know where her instructions were coming from.
      Until we know that, we are still in danger.
      Another question, wouldn’t a new PM be highly motivated to hunt out and expose those who destroyed the economy and undermined the democratic operation of their country?
      He doesn’t seem too fussed.
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:49pm
      - JackRabbit
        
        Another question, wouldn’t a new PM be highly motivated to hunt out and expose those who destroyed the economy and undermined the democratic operation of their country?
        
        imalwaysright,
        I agree with you. Howver many people live by what they think is right, but either suffer from ‘imposter syndrome’, lack the courage of their convictions come hell or high water, or have their own dark places that stop them taking action.
        
        It is a rare person who acts without any ego or even a shred of self doubt. Luxon is not one of those people.
        
        I have come to the conclusion that a PM or president needs to be empowered by the masses. That has happened in the USA and elsewhere, but the masses in NZ are still timid, and overwhelmed with media bullshit.
        
        Outside of NZ there is a wealth of truth, but here in NZ the bulk of the public act as if they are unwittingly part of the Truman Show.
        
        10 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 4:20pm
    - NZer In Exile
      
      I’m thinking it’s a lot simpler than all that. Most likely what the UN said was gospel to the former PM and fellow travelers. It’s filled with fellow far left ideologues (and other assorted scumbags) after all.
      
      4 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 7:59pm
- Jinky
  
  3 minutes saved on EVERY trip on what is a busy road. Shame it took so long to get speed limits reversed but a Good day for all us Mastertonians.
  
  38 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:31am
  - Scott
    
    Jinky – from your mouth to God’s ear.
    And it feels like 10 minutes! 😃
    
    10 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:53am
  - Warren Murray
    
    The ‘expert’ (Labour appointed) scientist decried the lack of evidence for this decision and trivialised the economic benefits. he should have applied his criticism to his own comments.
    
    17 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:09am
    - Warren Murray
      
      For context; he was interviewed on Radio NZ between 5-6pm last night
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:13pm
- Benedict Yu
  
  I don’t know why you are not vaccinated. However I agree with the welcome change to speed limits.
  
  5 23
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:48am
  - RoboRob
    
    It the choice issue. Under the right you can choose to get the Vax, under the left it is compulsory. I’m no anti vaxer but I hated the compulsion of covid, which is weird as I am also generally quite the rule follower!
    
    Yes, I count ‘If you are unvaxed you lose your job’ as compulsory.
    
    32 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:56am
  - Keith White
    
    I don’t know why you keep taking the same vaccine repeatedly although it fails to provide you with protection against the disease you fear, while each injection exposes you to the same – and accumulating – risk of side-effects.
    
    16 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:26pm
  - Ra Henare
    
    Bene,
    Congratulations
    You have joined the “wind the buggers up”” society
    
    ie
    I dont know why you are not vaccinated.!!!!
    
    Brilliant rev up
    
    7 4
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 3:00pm
    - Paul Marsden
      
      I think he’s serious.
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:57pm
- Allan
  
  I trust when you get to Fetherston you will wind the windows up and lock the doors.
  
  Is it still the feral shithole it was in the 90’s?
  
  10 3
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:30am
  - imalwaysright
    
    Well, if you haven’t been there since the 90’s then it should be OK
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 4:03pm
- gravedodger
  
  Sadly slow down for the looong villages that decline to install bypasses. They apparently need mummy govt to force people into their village but don’t understand there is nothing they want to buy
  
  10 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:47am
  - AitchW
    
    Cambridge has had a bypass for a number of years now. The place has never been busier! Getting heavy vehicles out of town is a real boon.
    Same in Taupo.
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 5:06pm
- Paulus
  
  The reason for cutting the speed limit there was a concept by Labour to slow you down so you can see the signs for their illustrious MP Mc Nutty so you did not miss him !
  
  12 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 11:18am
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    I heard Hipkins yell across the floor yesterday when Bishop was asking questions about the speed limits from Butterick, oh he is worried about his seat already. Quick as a flash Bishop yelled on no he is not anymore.
    
    On the news last night they asked s as bout 20 people in Featherston I think about the speed limit, 9 were stoked it changed back, and some were quintet they ever changed. One woman said I am a bit worried about the kids going to school, seeing there are no schools on state highways I will pass on that one
    
    16 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:47am
  - Scott
    
    Paulus, the afore mentioned Mr MacAnulty was quoted in the Wairarapa Times Age this week that he wanted the speed limits to go back to 100k but the NZTA wouldn’t listen to him!?
    
    Poor Mr MacAnulty! He tried valiantly to get the speed limits back up but he was stymied at every turn!?
    
    There is a reason that the former MP for the Wairarapa no longer enjoys the confidence of the majority of the electorate. Some unkind people would say that he is a socialist control freak and a lick spittle for the former Prime minister, fawning over her on all occasions. But I would never say that. 😎
    
    17 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:55am
Cassandra

Kiri Allan: “My child asked me at one point, ‘Why do so many people hate our language, hate te reo?’ It’s a heartbreaking conversation to have with young kids.” Nobody I know hates the Maori language. Allan should have told her daughter that. What I hate is the Maori language being used as a political weapon. If people want to converse or write in Maori then please do so but don’t expect me to understand what you’re saying or writing and please don’t combine Maori and English “Manglish” – because it is unintelligible.
103 4
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:06am
- Ron Jeremy
  
  Wonder if said child asked her why do people drink drive then run from the police ?
  
  64 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:12am
  - peterwn
    
    That would be the height of impudence and would have warranted a spanking in the old days.
    
    18 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:26am
  - Anthony Melchett
    
    Or where her daddy is?
    
    3 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 7:48pm
- Benedict Yu
  
  “… and please don’t combine Maori and English…”
  
  That is a battle that has been lost. Ironically it has been lost under the current government. The rhetoric of “English first” by New Zealand First has been run over by a Maori language and te ao Maori steam roller over the last 12 months.
  
  In many state sector agencies Maori language lessons are compulsory. You simply cannot do your job without understanding the Maori language. Your title has a Maori name, working groups have a Maori name, all of the IT systems have exclusively Maori names. The agencies you deal with will only be referred to by Maori names. You will recite waiata before EVERY meeting and at the end of every meeting.
  
  If you want a job, what are you supposed to do?
  
  79 4
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:14am
  - Yvette
    
    If you want a job, what are you supposed to do?
    
    You mean like covid vaccination mandates?
    What can go wrong?
    
    25 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:24am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      I never supported vaccine mandates other than for children.
      
      4 26
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:49am
      - john1234
        
        Children had the least need for COVID vaccination as they had the least risk of serious illness from it.
        
        31 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 9:51am
      - Keith White
        
        BY: Why did / do you want children who were and are at the absolute lowest risk of all groups from coronavirus infection, to be forced to have an injection which can have serious and occasionally lethal results* for those children?
        
        *notably, myocarditis and pericarditis?
        
        12 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 2:29pm
      - kiwimike
        
        I’m really sorry BY, that I can’t give you 100 downticks.
        
        Which is a shame because you give so much pleasure with your considered comments, but [No need for that – Mod].
        
        It’s the gaslighting of people with vaccine injuries, which I found out about at the Parliament protest.
        absolutely horrendous.
        
        Remembering the rubbish just saying “it is what it is” as the observation that she had made a 2 tier society.
        and the coercion of her and Chippy to us all to have to take a jab.
        
        Which we now know was ineffective (and they knew) and possibly is doing us all a damage, but they are hiding that from us.
        
        But worse, they gave out 14,000 exemptions (we don’t know who to or why?) and sacked 11,000 people.
        
        Mandates are not finished, people have not been rehired and compensation (like Trumps to the military sacked) is not being offered.
        
        a black mark against this coalition and all their supporters.
        
        10 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 2:50pm
      - JackRabbit
        
        Our own govt supports:
        
        (a) The informed consent process.
        (b) The right to choose.
        
        “Regardless of age, an individual and/or their parent/guardian must be able to understand:
        – that they have a choice
        – why they are being offered the treatment/procedure
        – what is involved in what they are being offered
        – the probable beneﬁts, risks, side-effects, failure rates and alternatives, and the risks and benefits of not receiving the treatment or procedure.
        
        You want mandates for children, in defiance of the law, leading to the following conclusions:
        
        [Mod – debate the topics, don’t make it personal]
        
        4 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:07pm
      - JackRabbit
        
        @benedict
        
        Read the section under informed consent.
        
        https://www.tewhatuora.govt.nz/for-health-professionals/clinical-guidance/immunisation-handbook/2-processes-for-safe-immunisation
        
        All immunisations are supposed to be voluntary, and never mandated.
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:44pm
  - G152
    
    And every month there are more ‘words’ that mean nothing in the media and get skipped
    
    22 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:24am
  - mandk
    
    What would happen if – in recognition of the supposed partnership between Māori and the Crown – someone asked if those present could sing God Save the King for a change?
    
    20 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:26am
  - cmm
    
    Surely only an activist would take a job like that.
    
    29 4
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:29am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      No.
      
      7 11
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:43am
      - cmm
        
        Genuine question BY: Why would a non-activist take a job like that?
        
        I doubt very much any of these are really useful jobs either (useful for the taxpayer that is).
        
        If you substitute in Maori to that extent, then clearly their performance is degraded. That can only mean one of two things:
        * The people involved do not care about performance.
        * They are silly make-work jobs where performance does not matter.
        
        I cannot understand why a productive person would seek to work there.
        
        23 3
        Report
        January 30, 2025 8:55am
      - RoboRob
        
        @cmm
        
        My wife is an early childcare teacher. She loves working with kids, especially those with aditional needs. She has post grade qualifications relating to children with diverse needs. To get her degree she had to do tons of Maori indoctrination. In her job she had to pepper her words with Te Reo. She has recently taken up a job with the MOE to work with and provide support to children with ‘diverse’ needs (I am sure I have the wording wrong). With the MOE she has to function as described by BY.
        
        So the answer is, she took a job ‘like that’ because she cares and wants to make a difference. The Maori side of things is simply one of the downsides of the job (in my opinion).
        
        Ironically her years in education and the workforce have made her blind to the issues of all the Maori stuff. It doesn’t worry her at all. In fact she has taken additional Te Reo courses. We have, different views, on this stuff 🙂
        
        14 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:04am
      - cmm
        
        Roborob:
        
        So what would happen if she just said no and used real English instead?
        
        “has to function like that”? Really? what would be the consequences if she did not?
        
        14 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:16am
      - imalwaysright
        
        Robo
        It sounds like your wife is agreeing to these practices under duress in order to provide help to the children.
        No one should have to take the knee to an invented ideology in order to practice their vocation.
        I’m surprised that the Human Rights Commission has not intervened in what is becoming a widespread infringement, if not denial, of our human rights.
        Good woman.
        
        10 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:47am
      - RoboRob
        
        @cmm & alwaysright
        
        I dont know how bad or what is required yet as my wife has yet to start he new role. I am only guessing based on what I know of the MOE.
        
        With regards to refusing, yeah if you felt strongly I am sure you could. However, as I mentioned, my wife isn’t bothered by this stuff at all and has bought into some of it. She wont be complaining.
        
        11 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:24am
    - Jinky
      
      You mean like nurses, social workers and doctor’s?
      
      14 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:33am
  - Cassandra
    
    Correction will have to start at the top and there will be resistance. I get Nga mihi from the staff of my retirement village (99% of residents speak only English) in every email. Winning at Stalingrad took a lot of effort.
    
    47 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:29am
    - pdm
      
      Cass I think it is going to get worse.
      
      Did I read or hear somewhere yesterday that Luxon is now showing signs of endorsing Co-Governance?
      
      Cannot recall where/when it was because yesterday afternoon became a bit hectic.
      
      17 4
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:40am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        That is utter bullshit, he has never mentioned it, rabble try to post crap with him saying these things, he has not said that or anything like it ffs
        
        7 11
        Report
        January 30, 2025 9:11am
      - RoboRob
        
        @G
        
        ‘He challenged Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern to build her case for co-governance with voters but told Morning Report National remained opposed to the creation of a new level of bureaucracy for health.
        
        He said the government needed to set out clear guidelines on what was and was not included for constitutional issues such as co-governance.
        
        “If we don’t, it drives division. If you think about things like the Treaty settlement process, there’s been very good public buy-in to that over successive governments, different types of governments because the case was made and and people said, that’s right, we need to do some redress there.” ‘
        
        Opposed to multiple departments, not opposed to co governance.
        
        Later in the article….
        
        ‘National believed that co-governance of natural assets involving iwi working with central and local government in the context of Treaty settlements is long-standing and has been supported by his party.
        
        Victoria University political scientist Dr Jack Vowles believes that part of the reason political parties can waltz around the co-governance expression is because it isn’t easy to understand in the first place.
        
        He told Morning Report that co-governance had been occurring under both National and Labour governments for more than 10 years.‘
        
        https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/465962/luxon-warns-of-division-if-government-coy-on-co-governance-plans
        
        That good enough for your G? Believe us now?
        Appology so calling us bullshiters?
        
        19 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:10am
      - Mark Hanley
        
        Roborob, demonstrates the complexity of policy making.
        
        Cogovernance bad….. Maori being given manangement decision making rights over our public services in the basis of race.
        
        Cogovernance good. Honouring treaty of waitangi claims whilst maintaining crown representation of the nz publics intereats.
        
        Cogovernance would have prevented the Te Urewera issues.
        
        0 0
        Report
        January 31, 2025 7:45am
    - Twinkle
      
      Our daughter in NZ academia was emailing an colleague in Australia who asked who this Nga Mihi person was as they were prominent in emails from NZ
      
      28 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:47am
    - Flossie
      
      Cassandra – have you asked your village WHY you do? Or voiced your dislike of being addressed in this manner? Sounds like you’d possibly have a fair bit of support from your fellow villagers.
      
      9 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:39am
      - Cassandra
        
        Flossie: yes – the reply is “head office directive”.
        
        7 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:25pm
    - sirknz
      
      ‘Nga mihi’ is a great shorthand for who you need to be careful with your speech around in the corporate world. That and pronouns in their email signature are 2 big red flags for not being able to trust someone with a bit of banter or to have any common sense.
      
      13 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:49pm
  - NK
    
    That is a battle that has been lost. Ironically it has been lost under the current government.
    
    How is it “ironic” it has been lost under Luxon’s leadership? He has said he wants an “English first” approach but has done nothing to instil that – just fluffy, nice words that mean nothing without action. And action is too difficult for him and the Nats.
    
    39 3
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:38am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      OK maybe ironic is the wrong word.
      
      13 4
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:44am
    - Paulus
      
      I believe that Luxon’s position since becoming Prime Minister of the Coalition Government will be his exit from politics before too long – 21 months before the next election.
      What is it he does not understand ?
      
      24 2
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:48am
      - pdm
        
        Paulkus – well he is starting to act and react like Todd Muller isn’t he.
        
        18 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 9:05am
      - pdm
        
        Oops. Apologies for the typo in your name Paulus.
        
        5 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 9:41am
      - kiwimike
        
        I think he really believes that there is a “partnership” written into the Maori version of the TOW.
        or at least he has been persuaded that is so.
        That the TOW is the Founding documant of NZ is written in to the National Party’s Constitution.
        
        That leads to the belief that Maori have/own 50% of everything or own NZ and we are the interlopers.
        
        I think he is a woke fool as he is an educated person.
        But he is a Racist and Undemocratic because of Co-Governance.
        AS like Ardern view it is a 2 tier society based on race.
        
        For me The TOW article 1 is clear in the english.
        
        as far as I am concerned ALL NZ citizens are equal and should be treated equally in Law and by Govt policies.
        
        How Luxon and National can’t see that I don’t know.
        I heard DPF at an AGM say that their worldview on Maori was so ingrained it and it would take a long rime to change.
        
        I don’t trust Winston Peters or Shane Jones, they are a bit “a bob each way” in the way they operate.
        REM Winston’s UTU gave us Ardern in the first place.
        
        7 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:04pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      Any new initiatives will have English names, do you want him to go Gestapo and force names changed back
      
      3 13
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:12am
      - RoboRob
        
        Yes!
        
        Compare and contrast Luxon and Trump.
        
        Both supposedly have the same agenda yet within days Trump has banned DEI from all federal agencies and formalised that there are only two genders. Within his first week.
        
        One year later, the governments pledge to have English first (a weak change anyway) has not taken effect and most government agencies are ignoring it.
        
        Trump has been firing people who refuse to enforce his DEI changes.
        
        Before you compare powers of Trump and Luxon, let me say. Luxon is MORE powerful. Trump is one of three pillars of government and the other two can and will block some of his agenda. Luxon is all powerful, he has to power to set agenda and make law. Trump cant make law (yes he can propose law but the house needs to confirm it).
        
        Luxon can actually do practically anything he wants. Take for example Adrian Orr. There has been discussion here around whether National can sack Orr. It cant, under current law. What it could do, if it was so enclined is re write the Researve bank act to allow it to do so. Boom, Orr gone. For good reasons historically NZ governments haven’t gone down that route often, but they certainly have the power.
        
        So, if Luxon really wanted to remove Te Reo and Te Aro (whatever that is 🙂 ) from government agencies, they could put a blanket ban on it within the week. They choose not to.
        
        21 3
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:23am
      - imalwaysright
        
        Robo
        Correct.
        It’s not the lack of ability to make the promised changes, rather it is the lack of will.
        
        We saw this with Adern, she gradually separated herself from election promises and then instituted the régime on behalf of her puppeteers.
        
        Luxon is looking more like he also has a hidden agenda.
        
        11 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:04am
  - Suze Wainwright
    
    Benedict, I think you’ll find you recite karakia at the start and end of every meeting, not waiata. Tut-tut
    
    17 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:39am
    - Jinky
      
      Both in the hospital I work at!
      
      14 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:34am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Yes, but clearly in English, I have reported on my three visits to hospital over three years, 2022 greeted by specialist in Māori, when my kidneys were not working ffs, many Māori greetings by nurses.
        
        June last year first hip. One greeting by specialist in Maori which I never replied to.
        
        Jan this year. Not one utterance of Maori by specialist, by surgeon, by anaesthetist, by nurses, even the hospital Chaplin visited and not an utterance, everything was clearly marked around the hospital in English first, when I received instructions and directions to surgery day, it was English only.
        
        I don’t care a f….k about a Maori version underneath in smaller writing
        
        6 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:59am
      - RoboRob
        
        @G
        
        One visit to a hospital where they didnt say Kia Ora to you doesn’t mean anything has changed.
        
        With regards to not giving a F about ‘Maori version in smaller writing underneath’.
        
        1) Why not. Can you not admit that this is a problem becuase your team might be at fault?
        2) Its not small writing underneath. See https://www.education.govt.nz/ as an example. The govt said English first for names etc. What the wokesters in the ministries have done is put Maori first then English but in bold. It’s a clever way of following the rule but not the intent. I can assure you that internally at the MOE everything is still Maori first and bigger and bolder. The name tag issued to visitors (for example) are Maori first in 20pt font and English second in 6pt font.
        
        8 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 1:26pm
    - kiwimike
      
      My wife refuses to accept the karakia unless they provide an english translation at work.
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:06pm
  - In Vino Veritas
    
    “If you want a job, what are you supposed to do”. Well, how about dying standing up when the alternative is living on your knees. Everyone has a choice Ben, and the NZ Government is not the only employer in NZ. Or the world.
    
    22 5
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:42am
    - Keith White
      
      IVV: “the NZ Government is not the only employer in NZ. Or the world.”
      
      Damn right. And the people of NZ are again finding this out the hard way.
      
      6 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 2:31pm
  - cmm
    
    This is a battle that can un-lost too.
    
    I would like to believe that the reason it was lost under the current government is that it already had momentum and the activists infecting these organisations just doubled down.
    
    It would be interesting to see what would happen if any of the people working there refused to play the game. I doubt they could be fired.
    
    22 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:51am
    - Jinky
      
      Not straight away but can be “managed out” for “undermining team culture”
      
      14 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:36am
      - NeverMindTheBollocks
        
        Would be an interesting case. At IRD you can fall asleep at work, abuse colleagues, and be constantly late to work, yet the ERA will keep you in a job.
        
        Sounds like the coworker from hell, but you can but admire her intestinal fortitude.
        
        http://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360562906/abusive-inland-revenue-worker-who-fell-asleep-work-back-payroll-after-sacking
        
        15 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:00am
      - cmm
        
        If Luxon got his balls off the fence and “did a Trump” then we could purge the state sector reasonably quickly.
        
        We don’t have the same Federal structure as USA, so it would take longer here.
        
        9 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:08am
      - Yvette
        
        cmm – If Luxon got his balls off the fence
        
        I have often wondered if that is the problem
        Does sitting on the fence damage your … that part of your – um –
        lower anterior abdominal aspect?
        
        9 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:50am
      - cmm
        
        Yvette: A bike is bad enough and a fence is worst.
        
        Of course size matters in this too. There is a reason you seldom see a ram sitting on a fence.
        
        I unfortunately have a few experiences to draw from. We are probably not sufficiently acquainted to share the details.
        
        10 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:27pm
      - Yvette
        
        Cmm – We are probably not sufficiently acquainted to share the details.
        
        Perhaps I can tell, Cmm, by your occasionally higher pitched writing
        
        11 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:33pm
      - cmm
        
        Yvette: Thanks for the chuckle.
        Much appreciated.
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:13pm
  - PurplePen
    
    I noticed Winston Peter’s was being chimed by the speaker in parliament this week, it was the secondary speaker, tall slim older guy. Anyway, the speaker said ‘that is not the tikanga of this house ..’. Peter’s immediately said ‘the what? the what?’ The speaker then said ‘that is not the rules and protocol of this house’. Peter’s then said ‘thank you. don’t insult me with that sort of talk’ or something similar.
    
    Pleased he called the speaker up on his use of manglish. But worrying that the speaker, who in this case was whiter than snow white, thought it OK to speak manglish and not Maori nor English.
    
    49 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:24am
    - Ghost
      
      Greg O’Connor
      
      21 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:36am
      - lifesgood
        
        Greg O’Connor is barely literate. I’ve never heard such a fool, oh, OK, maybe others, speak in the house. Why is he a speaker?
        
        8 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:37pm
    - MCōs
      
      Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
      I saw that exchange on TV.
      Winston Peters knew perfectly well what he meant. He was just being a [Mod – deleted]. He was wound up because he had been given some lip by a couple of Green MPs born offshore and maybe he was a bit pissed.
      I don’t know what caused Shane Jones to tell Ricardo Menendes March to go back to Mexico.
      
      2 39
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:10am
      - RoboRob
        
        I dont care if Winston did it becuase he was angry, it was the right thing to do.
        
        If we are expected to respect and accept Maori culture then they can damned well respect English culture, in this case the rules and procedures of parliament. Parliament doesn’t have ‘tikanga’, it has rules.
        
        27 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:43am
      - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
        
        How many Mexican parliamentarians are foreigners? Asking for a friend.
        
        3 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 7:27pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      That was O’Connor. I heard exactly what he said, he told Peters to stop using sunshine when shouting at people in his speech, he never once spoke in anything but English
      
      5 6
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:02pm
      - Ghost
        
        He did, you can start the video from 1.42.00
        
        https://videos.parliament.nz/on-demand?id=0e0d0e8c-103b-4f2f-cac5-08dd3fb4e32f&members=3d49aeac-8adf-497b-9400-ab7bb077bb8d
        
        8 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:48pm
  - Scooter
    
    They have to combine Maori words here and there into English because they know otherwise the majority will never learn or have use for the Maori language just on its own.
    
    10 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:29am
    - Paulus
      
      Weather programme on TVNZ used mixed Maori English as often as they can get away with it.
      Not to use it might incur dismissal.
      So, One year plus in and nothing has happened for which we v0ted.
      
      8 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:25am
      - imalwaysright
        
        Watched a tv1 weathergirl refer to clouds as ” big rainmakers in the sky”.
        Several times.
        
        10 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:46am
      - Don Beckett
        
        Had she forgotten the Maori word for it ?
        Sounds like she was speaking ‘Red Indian’. 🙂
        
        10 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:30pm
      - imalwaysright
        
        How🤚🏻
        Bring much wampum.
        We smoke peace pipe!
        
        8 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 1:17pm
      - JeffW
        
        Who would vote National expecting real change rather than better management of Labour programmes?
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:02pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      I heard him telling Peters off, he never spoke in Māori in any way, he told Peters to stop yelling at people saying Sunshine to greet them, not sure what part was Māori
      
      0 11
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:04pm
      - wsk12345
        
        He used the word tikangi. Peter’s asked what and from memory O’Connor clarified as rules. I definitely heard that on Twitter clip.
        
        4 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:55pm
    - Jake Dee
      
      There is a very interesting project to be done here, maybe by an academic linguist or maybe by an enthusiastic amateur, to track exactly what terms have been introduced, when and where.
      Languages are constantly changing but they change for reasons, what is the reason here?
      I will be double damned if anyone can show me a Kiwi who demands that their accountant does their taxes and produces a balance sheet in Maori, an electrician who draws a wiring diagram in Maori, a pharmacist who tracks prescriptions in Maori, a pilot doing pre-flight checks and navigation in Maori etc. etc.
      This shift is being done by specific people for a specific reason.
      It is In-group status and allegiance signaling within The Professional Managerial Class (PMC).
      
      2 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 6:03pm
  - Michael
    
    Not a Maori name in sight with the SPCA. A breath of fresh air
    
    11 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:37am
    - Paulus
      
      St John have lost considerable private funding since changing their name.
      They don’t care, I understand, as they hope the Taxpayer will fund them more.
      Still a great lot however.
      
      9 2
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:27am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Yes, they tried to ask me for a donation, I said I would but you changed your name and no more donation from me
        
        9 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:05pm
      - kiwimike
        
        Good I hope it is more.
        
        4 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:12pm
      - lifesgood
        
        Changing their name is a disgrace. St John’s originated in England in 1877, Maori have nothing to do with it. I refuse to donate to them until they get rid of this faux Maori nonsense. Why does our european culture have to be subsumed?
        
        11 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:43pm
  - David Garrett
    
    Bene: What do you do? Get the fuck out of the public system and get a job with an employer who has no time for all that bullshit.
    
    13 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:49am
    - Jules99
      
      It’s interesting. I run a business and don’t do any of the Maori stuff. I have a few public sector clients and initially I get the old nga mihi etc. But when I don’t use it back, they drop it and there is no further Maori language in any communications. It’s all show and conformity in the public sector – in the real world we just get on with it.
      
      14 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:15pm
      - Jake Dee
        
        Well exactly, if you show no interest in trading for those woke status points then there is no point in them pushing it any further, you are not in that particular market.
        
        4 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:10pm
    - graham
      
      Unfortunately it’s not just the public system. I know at least one of the big four Australian banks is right into “Te Ao Maori”, with karakia at meetings, waiata sessions (including their very own waiata), Kapa Haka groups, etc. I assume the others are also.
      
      I don’t think it’s quite as bad as the state sector agencies that Benedict is talking about, but it’s up there.
      
      10 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:28pm
      - Jake Dee
        
        Those Banks are still being run by The Professional Managerial Class (PMC) and are still in the market of Woke Capital.
        
        4 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:12pm
    - Keith White
      
      Exactly, DG. The trend is accelerating. Get out of the public system and get out of NZ.
      
      8 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 2:33pm
  - Gravelroad
    
    An example that I have trouble understanding is Hato Hone / St John’s.
    Used to be St John’s Ambulance service.
    Now often shortened to Hato St John’s.
    Hato being Saint and Hone being John in te Reo.
    But what’s the point?
    The Order of St John’s activities began in about 1070.
    I doubt any Maori back then would ever have heard of it so why would they wish to appropriate the name of an ancient saint they knew nothing about today?
    
    17 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:53pm
    - nz_aj
      
      They hadn’t arrived in NZ
      
      4 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 4:23pm
    - Steve Otto N Shore
      
      The point is to make you conform to the 2040 Maori takeover.
      Am I wrong?
      
      6 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:55pm
      - Jake Dee
        
        Yes you are wrong.
        This isn’t a Maori takeover. It is a woke PMC takeover in brownface.
        The Maori element is particular to NZ but the origin of this are not traditional Polynesian culture, it is modern western culture.
        
        2 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:17pm
- Blog-aholic
  
  Proof positivs that Te reo maori has been both politicised and weaponised when a child believes that people hate the language. Allen had a duty of care to spend some time being a reasoned thinking parent but I doubt that happened because she is part of the ilk that have politicised and weaponised it without care of thinking where that might take it.
  
  25 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:15am
  - Paulus
    
    Allen is a parent but whose child is it, for, as a Lesbian she is only married (currently unmarried) to another women ?
    With out the carrying of a baby there can never be the same bond as a real mother.
    
    11 6
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:29am
    - Flossie
      
      That is a slur on all adopting mothers.
      
      7 5
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:41am
      - Anthony Melchett
        
        It’s factually correct though.
        
        3 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 8:15pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Can you imagine the outrage if Luxon went all commie and shut it down openly, can you imagine the rhetoric
    
    5 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:07pm
    - RoboRob
      
      So what. Who cares. He could have changed it in year one and by election nobody would have cared / remembered. He might have even been surprised and gotten a lot of support for it.
      
      Look at what is happening with Trump. He has doubled down on his anti DEI and strong illegal immigration reform. The result is that support for Reps on immigration is at +22, when he first came in (in 2016) it was -9. Thats a 30% poll shift in Reps favour. All becuase they were willing to voice an opinion that was slammed in the media but supported by the population.
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 1:31pm
- cmm
  
  Let us be clear about the normal, and proper use of language mixing.
  
  It is perfectly fine to borrow words into a language. That is a good way to add words for new concepts to a language.
  
  For example, when the Brits arrived in NZ, they likely had never encountered many plants and birds before. Using the Maori word is perfectly fine- eg. kumara.
  Also new Maori concepts such as mana or Taupo etc.
  
  When a word gets borrowed into a language it now becomes part of the borrowing language. It is now subject to the rules of the borrowing language.
  
  The donor language has no rights to insist on how the borrowers pronounce the borrowed work. That is how we end up with adaptations – eg beef in English instead of the French bœuf. Maori can say “pirihimana” instead of “policemen”.
  
  But, it seems these rules do not apply for Maori and Maori can tell English speakers how to say “Taupo” in an English sentence.
  
  Bullshit. That is not how languages work.
  
  Manglish is not Maori. It is English infused with excessive and unnecessary borrow words. If that is what passes for Maori, then that language is dead and we’re wasting a whole lot of money funding it.
  
  54 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:28am
  - MCōs
    
    I’m sure the British had encountered the kumara before as the sweet potato. It’s not native to NZ and was brought out here from elsewhere by the Māori because they weren’t aware of the similar potato, which would have been a much better vegetable because it keeps better after harvesting.
    
    11 5
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:07am
    - cmm
      
      I expect a few Brits had encountered the sweet potato/kumara, but it would unlikely have been a staple food as it is in NZ.
      
      For example, the sweet potato had been in South Africa since the 1500s (most likely brought by the Portuguese, but possibly also Arabs in the 1400s), but is largely limited to the North Eastern parts of the country.
      
      However that was only in a few areas and sweet potatoes were not generally available to early British settlers in South Africa.
      
      About the only time I ate sweet potatoes when I was growing up was when we bought them for Xhosa people who had grown them themselves. We called them by the same name as the Xhosa used: “patats” (which is derived from the name the Portuguese used, which is also borrowed from some South American language or whatever).
      
      It was only later (maybe late 1980s) that sweet potatoes became commercially farmed and a reasonably common vegetable in South African supermarkets etc. While English speakers then called them sweet potatoes, the Afrikaans name was “patat” – same as the Xhosa/Zulu name, but a slightly different pronunciation.
      
      I would expect the same was generally true here. The first encounter most British settlers would have had with sweet potatoes was when they say the Maori with them. Adopting the Maori name would have made perfect sense.
      
      The main point though is that once “kumara” got borrowed into NZ English it became an NZ English word. It is no longer a Maori word while used in English.
      
      16 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:59am
      - coge
        
        They are called Jerusalem potatoes in the UK. I’m sure there is a story behind that one!
        
        5 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:09am
      - Paulus
        
        Not aware, for my many UK years, of having heard of the Kumara!
        
        5 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:31am
      - cmm
        
        The Americans call them yams, although real yams are very different.
        
        In South Africa, Jerusalem artichokes are an awful watery kind of yam that my whole family loved – except me. I pretty much eat any veges except those.
        
        5 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:32pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        @coge
        
        Jerusalem potatoes are another name for Jerusalem artichokes/sunchokes (Helianthus tuberosus) which was grown quite widely in Europe and UK from 1600s onward.
        
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem_artichoke
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:40pm
      - cmm
        
        Paulus: I thought it obvious I was talking about the early Brit settlers coming to NZ and encountering sweet potatoes for the first time – not recent people in UK.
        
        People in UK, just like Africans, do not call them kumara. Kumara (and similar) is the Polynesian name.
        
        Extremely few of those early settlers would have previously encountered sweet potatoes and would have needed a name for them. The Maori name made perfect sense.
        
        Remember that then there was no cheap refrigerated shipping bringing fancy foods from all over the world. Unless you were very wealthy, chances are you would very seldom encounter exotic foods.
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:41pm
      - Jack5
        
        Perhaps the word “kumara” comes from a South American language, and there’s been much speculation about trade between Polynesia and South America.
        
        This source says the name for the vegetable, in Quechua, a South American language, is “cumar” or “cumara”, and links it to a region in Ecuador where kumara were grown:
        
        https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/kumara-controversy-nz-scientists-question-study-findings/EAWDRY2RBIDTFVMTT5DFRAR5B4/
        
        This Quechua online dictionary translates “sweet potato” as kumar:
        
        https://glosbe.com/en/qu/sweet%20potato
        
        3 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 5:10pm
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      I’m sure the British had encountered the kumara before as the sweet potato.
      
      Only the very wealthy could have afforded them..as they needed to be imported.
      
      https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/history/ghcc/blog/the_most_delicate/
      
      It’s only in recent years that some of the hardier (new breeds) varieties have been grown in UK.
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:31am
  - Yvette
    
    … and we’re wasting a whole lot of money funding it
    
    Estimates range from $200m to $600m a year
    Nobody really knows, including Willie Jackson, ChatAI or the Government
    
    12 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:11am
  - Flossie
    
    I am very tired of being pulled up if I say, for instance, “Witianga” rather than “Fitianga” by people who then go on to say Yous orta arks how to say it, or similar.
    
    20 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:01am
    - imalwaysright
      
      Flossie
      Tell them to whuck off.
      
      17 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:51am
    - graham
      
      Flossie, it astounds me how precious people get about pronouncing Maori words and placenames absolutely correctly – to the quite ridiculous extreme where an ad was banned after the ASA complaints board agreed unanimously that mispronouncing a Maori place name (Rangiora) caused harm to the language and was likely to offend consumers – whilst we are constantly treated to English being utterly mangled.
      
      12 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:54pm
      - Bobba Fret
        
        I love listening to my car’s navigation system pronounce some of our place names. Very amusing.
        
        7 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 2:09pm
  - PurplePen
    
    Yes. They are borrowed words, which is the technical name in linguistics. But they are not artificially inserted. They are borrowed, usually when cultures meet and one doesn’t yet have a word for the thing in the other culture.
    
    Agree also with respect to pronunciation. When you say Paris in English you don’t pronounce it as if you’re speaking French. Similarly with Maori words spoken when you’re speaking English. The Maori words will take on the pronunciation rules for English. They won’t retain the rules for the foreign language, in this case Maori.
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 4:04pm
  - John Loveridge
    
    I had this argument with my kids’ high school. All the unnecessary Maori does neither language any good and reduces Maori to a form of slang.
    
    I also mentioned that English is already a second language for my wife, and all the Maori just confuses her and renders school communications unintelligible.
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 4:51pm
  - Jake Dee
    
    I’m sorry but that is EXACTLY how languages work, there are different vocabularies and rules for different classes within a society.
    For example, old time English scholars were constantly dropping Latin into their speech to show how damned intelligent and educated they were, they even invented some faux Latin terms actually based on the Anglo-Saxon, only another scholar could tell the difference.
    There are a whole bunch of technical terms to describe it.
    The Acrolect is the “highest” or most prestigious variety of a language, in the UK it is “Received Pronunciation” (RP) or at least it used to be. Then there is Mesolect in the middle and the Basolect at the bottom. The classic example for that in English used to be East London Cockney, but I think some sort of Chav / Chud street slang has probably overtaken that over the last few generations.
    What we are seeing in New Zealand is not a revival of an indigenous language, but rather the creation of a Professional Managerial Class acrolect using borrowed terms from Maori.
    
    3 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 6:35pm
- AitchW
  
  I think Kiri Allan is lying. What kid asks that and why?
  
  38 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:34am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    My suspicion, too… or she is politicising her 8 year-old child.
    
    15 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:32am
    - Sparrow
      
      “Grandpa why do you have scars on your back”?whilst bathing him. A long pause ” the teacher strapped me because I was talking Māori ” True story.
      
      4 4
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:59am
  - Keith White
    
    She’s got form.
    
    8 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:34pm
- Paulus
  
  Do we know yet how many Maori actually speak Maori with a degree of fluency ?
  As there are only some possible 16% of the population it seems sad that people such as Allen still continue her sort of obsessional diatribe, presumably from her upbringing, and because of her one time Minister, and her criminal conviction.
  
  28 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:44am
  - kevn
    
    Paula… She is just doing a ‘look/listen at me, I’m still relevant’ PR exercise.
    
    28 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:49am
  - Flossie
    
    She can say whatever she likes. My problem is giving her airtime – or column inches if you like. Apart from her daughter who really cares what she thinks.
    
    36 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:50am
    - imalwaysright
      
      I wouldn’t believe anything she said, especially the bit about the 6 yr old child supposedly engaging in an esoteric discussion on the public opinion of a minority language.
      
      27 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:18am
      - zulumonster
        
        I can believe it (just) – because it is in the nature of children to ask questions. And I suspect Kiri’s daughter may have been bombarded with diatribes on how white people hate Maori language …
        
        9 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:27am
  - pdm
    
    `Do we know yet how many Maori actually speak Maori with a degree of fluency ?’
    
    Not a hell of a lot Paulus. For example I have a good friend, age 78 and first cousin of the late Maori King who to my knowledge speaks no Maori at all. If he does he learned most of it recently.
    
    In fact I suspect the greatest number speaking Maori are `Pakeha wannabe Maori’ – like Chloe Swarbrick and her mates.
    
    26 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:08am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      5%
      
      3 3
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:15am
      - Don Beckett
        
        Yes, I would think between 4 & 7% of Kiwis – not only Maori – who speak Maori fluently. Of those I would think 4 or 5% would be Maori (or part thereof 🙂 )
        
        5 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:01am
      - Paulus
        
        5% of what – Maori I presume not of the population.
        
        5 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:32am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Paulus. They have stated this fact that 5% of the POPULATION speak Māori fluently, I note I got 3 down votes, utterly pathetic, people ask, I put up what had been stated, and you are down ticked by fools
        
        2 10
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:12pm
    - fightingtemeraire
      
      The Maori King wasn’t a fluent Maori speaker
      
      15 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:22am
      - pdm
        
        Fits in with what I know of that age group of the family – it was not a priority.
        
        5 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 9:47am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Even the female co thingy of TOM stated in the house she is not fully fluent, yes she does ask a written down question in Māori, but reverts to English when speaking during her supplementary questions
        
        8 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:14pm
    - Blog-aholic
      
      her (in) mates.
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:22am
    - RichardF
      
      In the TPB select committee, Gini Anderson spoke more te reo than Debbie Packer when questioning David Seymour.
      
      9 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:27am
    - Jethrod
      
      Yes, and her second question in the House is ALWAYS in English. She must get coached by the person next to her on correct pronunciation.
      Orperhaps she now knows by heart what…”do you stand by all the governments statements and actions “
      
      7 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:59am
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      When data on iwi members was released earlier this month it showed the overall percentage of Māori te reo speakers has remained basically unchanged, with 18.4 percent in 2013 and 18.6 percent in 2023.
      
      https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/te-manu-korihi/530418/concern-over-low-percentage-of-maori-speaking-te-reo
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:37am
    - wsk12345
      
      I have Maori neighbours (well she is Maori, he is white) and their kids have built houses on the land around them – proper subdivided off the family block. She – grandma- is fluent in English, Maori and another European language. Her kids speak some Maori and two of the grandkids are bilingual at 6 and 8 years old. Lovely family, all hard workers, one family is self employed, one sadly got myocarditis from the jab and can no longer do his job.
      
      Could not ask for better neighbours and the young kids are super well mannered, happy kids who are on their bikes etc all day not on screens. The multigenerational approach works well for them all.
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 11:55am
    - David Garrett
      
      pdm: What everyone is frightened to say is the Maori language was virtually lost simply because they didn’t value it – unlike all the Tongan kids in my extended family who all – or virtually all – are fluent in both Tongan and English.
      
      They achieve that very simply, by doing what Ngata insisted on in the 1930’s – Tongan [Maori in Ngata’s case] only at home, English only at school. And yes, Maori kids did get “beaten” for speaking Maori at school – beating was the standard punishment for everything, right into the 1970’s. It was a rare month when I didn’t get caned at least once.
      
      The same is true of all Chinese kids – fluent in both Mandarin AND Cantonese as well was English because their parents value their first language(s) and instill it in their children.
      
      The Maori language was alive at well at the end of the war – I have seen old film clips of Maori commanders addressing their soldiers in Maori. I have seen a clip of members of the Maori Battalion returning to Crete in the 1990’s and talking among themselves in Maori.
      
      So somewhere between the late 1940’s and now, the Maori stopped valuing their language – it’s as simple as that. Now some Maori are trying to revive it. Good on them – as long as the taxpayer doesn’t have to pay. No Chinese family gets as much as $1 from the taxpayer to teach their kids Mandarin. They just do it.
      
      18 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:08pm
      - Jules99
        
        My mum, who was a primary school principal with a speciality in teaching literacy, used to say they prefer the kids to speak their mother tongue at home and learn English at school. That way they learn good English, not the pigeon spoken at home. Mind you, I’m not sure about the quality of English of some teachers these days.
        
        13 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:24pm
      - riffer
        
        I would speculate, David, that the loss of the Maori language co-incided with the migration of many Maori from the provinces to the cities in the early 1950s, and a subsequent removal from places where it was commonly spoken to a place where it was seldom spoken.
        
        12 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:38pm
      - cmm
        
        riffer: You are likely right, and, likely at least two different forces come in to play:
        
        1) The environment changes with many more English speaking (or at least non-Maori speaking) people to deal with. Also a bunch more new concepts that need to be learned and dealt with on a day to day basis and maybe using English is easier for these.
        
        2) Often people moving to the cities want to be seen as sophisticated relative to the country folk they left behind. One way to show you’re sophisticated and not a country bumpkin is to speak English. Another is to consume more Western goods.
        
        I saw the same in South Africa. English speaking and wine consumption is very uncommon in rural Zulus (rural Zulus insist on speaking Zulu to everyone and will drink beer). But the Zulus in the cities will want to be seen as sophisticated and having shrugged off their rural roots . They will speak far more English and drink wine and wear far more European-syle clothing to show their change in status.
        
        So, I suspect the same is likely to have happened here too.
        
        7 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 1:03pm
      - imalwaysright
        
        I got beaten at school for being left handed.
        I’m glad my teachers weren’t the fussy types.
        
        9 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 1:27pm
      - Sparrow
        
        Not True. It was beaten out of many at school.
        
        1 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 1:49pm
      - Ra Henare
        
        David, interested in where you get the stat .
        
        “”The same is true of all Chinese kids – fluent in both Mandarin AND Cantonese””
        
        I used to travel extensively in China pre Covid.
        The Mandarin/Cantonese seems to be very regional focused. Northern China Mandarin ONLY.
        Southern China, a mix.
        
        Hongkong (now china) Cantonese.
        
        I use to have problems when getting my factory in Beijing(Mandarin) talking to Graphic designers in Hong Kong(Cantonese).
        
        Often, one lot didn’t have a clue what the other was saying. Of course, this was not base level language use. ie Hello, how are you, whats your name etc.
        
        Resolved the problem with a different graphic design firm with some Mandarin speaking staff
        
        7 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:22pm
      - Dave
        
        Pupils arrive at school able to speak their parents’ language. If some years later they leave school unable to speak their parents’ language because it was beaten out of them, then either corporal punishment is much more effective than its critics admit, or the language was not the treasure its proponents now claim.
        
        Majority languages often exert steady pressure on minority languages in more ways than physical force. A notable example is the triumph of English over the French spoken by Norman lords in the 300 years after 1066.
        
        2 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 7:01pm
  - cmm
    
    I doubt very many Maori can speak enough to go through a day without using English as their primary language.
    
    There was a hilarious event at (inaudible) where their ultra-woke CEO came from America and it was decided to give a full “Maori welcome” with all the nose rubbing etc.
    
    Approx 10% of the NZ staff have at least some Maori heritage, but none of them could string together a sentence – let alone knew the protocols.
    
    As it turned out, the only two employees who knew what to do were a South African and a Pom.
    
    So the two ultra-white men – neither born in NZ, ended up performing the “Traditional Maori Welcome”.
    
    He was handed a “Traditional Maori Carving” made by another white guy (this one actually born in NZ – but of immigrant Dutch parents) on a bandsaw and detailed with a Dremel.
    
    The CEO was hugely emotional and felt very special to have been accepted etc and added it to long list of ethnic experiences.
    
    I was invited to attend, but I am sure I’d have thrown up.
    
    10 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:53pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      Last century I spent a brief time working for the Gummint. Yea I know. Achieved my objective in 6 months against my planned 2 years.
      
      I digress.
      
      Need ed to hire a Maori Liaison person. Requirement that they speak Maori.
      Lovely young Maori Lady bounced in to my office for an interview.
      Had assumed she met the language qualification.
      
      Gobsmacked when in response to a question she said. I am a fluent listener, from listening to my Nanna’s, but not conversational in the language.
      
      I wonder how many people are fluent listeners.
      PS. I am a conversational listener, but would never promote myself as a Maori Language speaker.
      
      6 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:29pm
- kowtow
  
  It is not only highly political , it is also pathetically patronising .
  
  Patronising of the majority and of the tiny minority of Maori who do use it .
  
  To think that officialdom start and end communications with a greeting and sign off in one language ( that basically no one uses) but the content of the letter , notice is entirely in English . Pathetic.
  
  Headings too , on signage etc . Same thing.
  
  It is in itself racist as it’s intent is not communications , but empty virtue signalling .
  
  Furthermore , it is almost definitely top down directive type dictate , very possibly from the Ardernista office itself , which has no relationship to the will of the people .
  
  Is it any wonder thinking , normal people resent being treated like French geese being force fed this neo Marxist diet of division .
  
  I suspect the officialdom and ngo types doing this don’t “understand the essence” of democracy .
  
  21 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:50am
  - greybeard
    
    The maorification of the English Language in New Zealand is a Fait Accompli.
    Maori see it as a Sine Qua Non. The previous Laissez-Faire attitude of the old maori Reich has gone and been replaced by “venimus vidimus vicimus” and everyone else can vaffanculo.
    
    8 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 3:39pm
- Bobba Fret
  
  Why are all these ex politicians that were useless at politics, suddenly all popping up in news and trying to stay relevant, and think that their opinion is relevant. They should keep their opinions to themselves and disappear. They get one vote just like me.
  
  18 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:10am
  - Keith White
    
    They are looking for a space at the taxpayer-funded iwi-troughs.
    
    8 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:36pm
- PurplePen
  
  You would think that those Maori that rabbit on about their taonga, Te ao Maori and tikanga etc would be incensed at the simultaneous mixing and artificial insertion of Maori words into English.
  
  18 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:18am
- I remember when
  
  I see the NZ Herald breaking news headline says that Kiri Allan ‘slams’ the Bill.
  
  It isn’t even news let alone a headline!
  
  If her submission agreed with the Bill that would have been a headline.
  
  15 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:40am
  - Ian
    
    It seems that the MSM only report the views of people who oppose the Bill, not anyone that supports it…
    
    10 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:46am
    - riffer
      
      Well, if you don’t take into account the quarter of the article that covered David Seymour’s submision to the bill and his response to Kiri Allan’s submission that might be true.
      
      3 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:54pm
- coge
  
  Kiri made all that up. Surprised?
  
  11 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:07am
- NZer In Exile
  
  “Why do so many people hate our language, hate te reo?”
  
  I’m thinking years of listening to irrational BS and lies from hysterical activists?
  
  4 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:04pm
Bridgenag

Climate Change: A Tale of Two Theories

Consolidated studies…….

”It is also implicit that all measures to reduce carbon dioxide emissions will have no bearing on our climate.”

https://open.substack.com/pub/sandrews/p/climate-change-a-tale-of-two-theories?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
22 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:07am
- MarkF
  
  Hard to disagree with that when you consider that the earth is collecting somewhere around 200TW (200 with 12 zeros) from the sun continuously.
  
  12 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:38am
Benedict Yu

Looks like RFK Jr could face resistance by some Republican senators.

“Trump already had a close shave in the Senate last week with his Defense Secretary nominee, Pete Hegseth. Three Republican senators — Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine — voted against the Army veteran, but he was confirmed with the tiebreaking vote of Vice President Vance.”

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5109984-bill-oreilly-robert-f-kennedy-jr-nomination-doomed/

Four senators would need to defect. However it is at least encouraging that his awful beliefs about vaccines are coming under scrutiny.

Live coverage..

https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cwyw5l584knt
13 32
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:07am
- Yvette
  
  Caroline Kennedy Urges Senators to Reject Her Cousin’s Nomination
  In a scathing letter to lawmakers considering Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination for health secretary, Ms. Kennedy called her cousin unfit for the job and a “predator” who led family members to addiction.
  
  – “His basement, his garage, and his dorm room were the centers of the action where drugs were available, and he enjoyed showing off how he put baby chickens and mice in the blender to feed his hawks,” Ms. Kennedy wrote. “It was often a perverse scene of despair and violence.”
  
  – Ms. Kennedy expressed particular outrage over the new disclosures in his ethics agreement filed with the Senate, which she described as outlining how his “crusade against vaccination has benefited him in other ways.”
  She cited Mr. Kennedy’s decision to keep a financial stake in litigation against Merck, which makes a key vaccine against the human papillomavirus (HPV) that is administered to protect against cervical cancer.
  “In other words, he is willing to enrich himself by denying access to a vaccine that can prevent almost all forms of cervical cancer and which has been safely administered to millions of boys [?] and girls,” Ms. Kennedy wrote.
  
  – Her letter painted Mr. Kennedy as a charismatic figure, “willing to take risks and break the rules,” and able to attract others through the strength of his magnetic personality. Then she traced a tragic history of Mr. Kennedy’s influence over other family members.
  “But siblings and cousins who Bobby encouraged down the path of substance abuse suffered addiction, illness and death,” she wrote, “while Bobby has gone on to misrepresent, lie and cheat his way through life.”
  
  – But Ms. Kennedy was harsh in criticism of her cousin’s advocacy against vaccines, describing it as part of an addiction to attention and power.
  “Bobby preys on the desperation of parents of sick children — vaccinating his own children while building a following by hypocritically discouraging other parents from vaccinating theirs,” she wrote.
  
  – “They deserve a secretary committed to advancing cutting-edge medicine to save lives, not rejecting the advances we have already made,” Ms. Kennedy wrote. “They deserve a stable, moral and ethical person at the helm of this crucial agency. They deserve better than Bobby Kennedy — and so do the rest of us.”
  – NYT (subscription-wall)
  
  I hope to avoid “pasting but not commenting” by saying that pasting this here is the comment. Caroline Kennedy trashes her cousin, which is a very important comment.
  I rest her case.
  
  5 11
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:26am
  - wsk12345
    
    The guy is, what , 70? I believe he had his kids vaccinated in the 1970s, yet became an “anti vaxxer” only in this century. Hardly hypocritical, I would hope anyone would be open to change their mind as they learn more.
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:00pm
  - David Garrett
    
    The years have not been a friend to Ms Kennedy…
    
    10 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:13pm
  - Ra Henare
    
    Family feud in full swing….
    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13775985/Kennedy-family-feud-RFK-endorse-Trump.html
    
    5 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 3:34pm
- Matt Long
  
  An example of how leftists amplify disinformation here. Even some of the comments on this blog reflect the concerted disinformation drive. The same tactics they use against Trump.
  RFK JR: “As you know, because it’s been repeatedly debunked, that statement that I made on the Lex Fridman podcast was a fragment of the statement. I said there are no vaccines that are safe and effective, and I was going to continue for every person. Every medicine has people who are sensitive to them, including vaccines. He interrupted me at that point. I’ve corrected it many times, including on national TV. You know about this Senator Wyden and so bringing this up right now is dishonest.”
  https://x.com/charliekirk11/status/1884629416166478159
  
  34 4
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:27am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
    It is all gaslighting. He is an anti vaxxer.
    
    7 37
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:46am
    - Ross Bayer
      
      BY
      Yesterday after your post I had a look at the vaccine schedule for US up to the age of five.
      From memory 42 shots and THERE MY FRIEND IS ALL THE EVIDENCE YOU NEED.
      
      Do you think there is any possibility that the health system in the US has been hijacked by money making enterprise and some change is needed maybe a disruptor?
      
      Do you not understand that the previous regime removed the façade that the government is working in the best interests of its citizens
      PS there are still people out there who believe in the fairy dust sprinkled by the leader of the previous regime
      
      15 3
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 9:21am
      - Interested Party
        
        Yes I understand kids in the US get a lot more vaccines than kiwi kids.
        
        [Mod – debate the topics without making it personal]
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:10am
      - wsk12345
        
        Who knew there were, what, 20 diseases so dangerous we should have been vaccinated. Yet we all survived ALL of them…. What are the chances???!!!
        
        Seriously which of the current vaccinations subvert death or injury from an illness in healthy kids? Meningitis seems to only occur in south Auckland. Similarly measles. The cervical cancer one is a big flop (HPV) in terms of preventing CC, the whooping cough one doesn’t stop transmission. Hep B is sexually transmitted so not really a problem for kids. So in the a sense of smallpox and polio, what are healthy kids actually in danger of?
        
        4 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 4:13pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      Bene,
      I think your revups are getting, maybe, a bit tiresome????
      
      Maybe find a new hobby horse????
      
      Just a thort when nothing else will do.
      
      Almost as tiresome as someone from the North Shore blathering on about some blokes videos as tho it is earth-shattering news.
      
      ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!! Sorry.
      Carry on blathering on.
      This is KB
      
      I support your freedom of speech!!
      
      7 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:42pm
    - Jake Dee
      
      Well there is clearly some gaslighting or perception manipulation going on here but why do you believe that it is coming from RFK Jr. and not his opponents?
      The correct approach here is surely to judge the man on his own direct words and statements not second hand from his rivals.
      RFK Jr is a political defector from his powerful family and clique, there has got to be some bad blood there, his multiple affairs and suicide of his ex-wife probable have something to do with that.
      His family history is important political baggage but hardly relevant to the question of vaccines.
      What is relevant to the question of vaccines is the fact that the pharmaceutical industry does about $1.6 TRILLION worth of business every year. The US Secretary of Health will have considerable influence on a lot of that gigantic pile of money.
      we have to expect perception distortion and propaganda from ALL sides.
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 6:54pm
    - NZer In Exile
      
      Michael Basset was on The Platform today and used a term that I liked. It was “intelligent but narrow minded people”. He was referring to the history revisionists who have pushed a fictional history around the treaty. I think the term could also apply to climate alarmists and others.
      
      6 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:08pm
    - Anthony Melchett
      
      Which is bad in your opinion.
      
      As I have said, if there is nothing wrong with the vaccines you will have no problem with them being investigated
      
      4 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:38pm
  - Grunter
    
    [Mod – debate without making it personal]
    
    2 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:54am
    - Grunter
      
      OK, I’ll try again (NB; My post that was deleted had zero ‘name calling’ simply a comment about consumption of mass media – which I refer to as the LLM “Lying Legacy Media). [Mod – your post was deleted because of the paragraph that’s only purpose was to attack a member]
      
      So, without reference to [Mod – deleted]
      
      My comment is that people who still regularly consume mass media content (daily newspapers, mainstream TV News, eg The BBC etc) are obviously being brainwashed by the narratives being pushed.
      
      Even Sir Bob Jones, who I respect as a commentator, has been affected IMO. He seems to read copious amounts of daily newspaper and his Trump aversion seems to have been heavily influenced by this (IMO).
      
      The Lying Legacy Media is the enemy here. And to me, their victims are obvious. I encourage everyone to avoid it.
      
      10 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:13am
      - Media hater
        
        Bob Jones is a real mixed bag on his own site. He said a few months ago, that Trump was undoubtedly going to lose and probably end up in prison.
        
        Then he backtracks and claims anyone speculates on who will win the presidential election is foolish.
        
        Not matter how successful he has been in life I get the impression he is nowhere near as smart as he thinks he is.
        
        12 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 1:27pm
      - NZer In Exile
        
        Hater everyone is defective in some way or another. No I’m not religious. Just an observation.
        
        3 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 8:10pm
- kevn
  
  BY… Point the bone at big pharma/business.
  https://www.midwesterndoctor.com/p/whos-trying-to-stop-america-from
  and unhinged pollies.
  https://www.zerohedge.com/political/watch-live-rfk-jr-confirmation-hearing-hhs-secretary-nicole-shanahan-goes-scorched-earth
  
  10 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:52am
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  I have just watched his questioning, he clearly stated he is not anti vax, he was anti the Covid jab because of unfinished testing, he clearly stated he is for measles and polio vaxes, he has been misquoted several times
  
  19 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:20am
- sungsamning
  
  His former running mate has threatened to fund challengers to any senator who votes no. I hope he gets nominated. It’ll be good to see a Kennedy at the cabinet table for the first time since 1965.
  
  9 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:20am
- Conservatarian
  
  This “anti-vaxxer” and “nut” also looks like a Greek God. I hope to hell I look as good as he does when I am 71 years of age.
  
  Certainly, I hope I don’t look like Dr “Rachel” Levine, an overweight man who thinks he is a woman, and who was the de facto HHS Secretary in “Biden’s” administration.
  
  8 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 3:28pm
Bridgenag

The 99th Congress That Called Vaccines “Unavoidably Unsafe”
By Ginger Taylor

“How can the AAP argue that vaccines are “unavoidably unsafe” in the Supreme Court in order to convince the federal government to grant you liability protection from vaccine injury, and then argue that, “vaccines are safe,” and “vaccines are mostly safe,” before this committee in order to convince the State of Maine to mandate that families receive counseling/buy vaccines from you?”

https://open.substack.com/pub/rwmalonemd/p/the-99th-congress-that-called-vaccines?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
14 3
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:07am
- Benedict Yu
  
  Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
  There is no such thing as a “safe” medicine. Jacinda started that rubbish. Are you channeling Jacinda?
  
  Give up on the anti vaxxer conspiracies. Comment on the moon landings for a change. 😃
  
  12 45
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:17am
  - Yvette
    
    Moon landings?
    Benedict, they were all shot on a sound stage in a back lot in the Pacific Palisades.
    
    downtickers diversion
    
    16 3
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:36am
    - riffer
      
      The most logical conclusion is that they did both – landed on the moon and shot video on a sound stage.
      
      8 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:56pm
    - Matt Long
      
      Ahhh, that must be why Governor New some caused the Palisades to be burnt down, to destroy the evidence of the sound stages.
      😉😉😉
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 1:20pm
  - Grunter
    
    Attacking others with “moon landing” calls seems a bit odd when I’ve never read anyone on KB mentioning moon landings.
    
    7 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 4:11pm
  - Ra Henare
    
    Bene ?
    In to deflection now?
    Are you losing traction on spreading your beliefs?
    
    This is not like the Bene I have grown to like over the years.
    
    Before this Vax hiccup, your comments always seemed to be measured and reasonable.
    
    3 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:20pm
- imalwaysright
  
  Good post Bridg
  You would think that exposing their own lie would void all of the government immunity agreements.
  
  11 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:44am
Grunter

More racism in the Beehive yesterday. Karen Chlour apparently still not “Maori enough” nor “the right kind of Maori”.

And Peter’s and Jones yelling “Mexicans go home”

You can disagree with opinions and arguments, but we all know reverting to collectivism identity politics and outright racism is just disgusting.
13 4
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:12am
- Scott
  
  Grunter – would someone be a bad person if they agreed with “Mexicans go home”? Like if you thought a particular MP was useless and didn’t even seem to like the country he had emigrated to? And who somehow got permission to visit his boyfriend when everyone else was locked down and couldn’t even visit their neighbour?
  
  Is it OK to wish he would go home? Just asking for a friend. 🙄
  
  18 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:51am
  - wsk12345
    
    I wish he would FO. And I’m pretty sure I’m not the friend you’re asking for. So there are at least two of us 🙂
    
    14 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:03pm
  - David Garrett
    
    Scott: Please don’t use that utterly puerile “asking for a friend” sentence at the end…the unlamented [for me] Maggie Pie used to do it all the time, and it drove me nuts.
    
    4 8
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:18pm
    - ISeeRed
      
      He might’ve been asking for an amigo.
      
      11 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 1:00pm
    - Conservatarian
      
      Shane Jones was interviewed by Hosking this morning about Jones’ energy portfolio. As an afterthought in the closing seconds of the interview, Hosking asked Jones about his comments yesterday regarding a certain Mexican politician.
      
      “Oh, it’s a Mexican standoff” Jones deadpanned. Hosking giggled.
      
      Superb stuff.
      
      Jones (and Peters, but strangely not Seymour, Chhour or McKee) is clearly allowed quite a bit of leeway when mudslinging as regards racial banter. I wonder if Luxon has noticed that yet?
      
      8 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:39pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      David,
      Offended?? Surely not 🙂
      
      This is the land of KB, where freedom of speech supposedly reigns and
      shock horror,
      that means people will get offended.
      
      Your comment uses the word puerile, very apt.
      
      5 2
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:46pm
  - kiwimike
    
    Scott x10 upticks…..
    
    4 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 3:31pm
Cassandra

Other People’s Money Example 387: IRD sacked worker who was late for work 75% of the time, fell asleep at work, did personal things at work despite management warning her over an 11 month period. Court has put her back on the payroll (no, she is not required to come to work) in the interim because of her traumatic life before she joined IRD. Lesson 1: OPM remains easy to spend; Lesson 2: take infinite care before employing anyone.
50 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:13am
- AitchW
  
  I cannot imagine turning up to work at a place where the employer clearly wants me gone. Coworkers would be resentful, managers hyper vigilant, it would not be a satisfying experience.
  But then I wasn’t brought up to believe that the world owes me a living.
  
  19 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:30am
  - peterwn
    
    But if you are otherwise unemployable then what are your options? You either tolerate the alleged BS for good pay or you go on the dole. That is why there are scorched earth employment relations disputes in organisations – the party who should leave cannot afford to leave. An employee with real talent faced with such issues would quietly go and find another job.
    
    11 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:47am
- greybeard
  
  Genuine question: if a traumatic life before being employed can be used as a reason/excuse to reinstate her, then would it have been OK to ask her , before she was employed, if she had had any traumatic experiences which could affect her subsequent employment ?
  Or does it only work one way , in favour of the employee not the employer ?
  
  24 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:46am
  - Flossie
    
    Yep. There’s a list as long as your arm of question that may not be asked at interview.
    
    14 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:52am
  - pdm
    
    I used to work with a guy, an Englishman, in the BNZ, Hastings, who had a siesta at about 1pm – 1.30pm every day after his lunch hour.
    
    One day the boss came down to see him about something, saw him asleep, and went back to his office laughing and saying he would come back later.
    
    He was in his mid 50’s and when he went on holiday he would lecture any young guys filling in for him about working to hard or fast and making him look bad.
    
    11 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:17am
    - Bobba Fret
      
      Gliding on
      
      4 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 2:33pm
- Tom Hunter
  
  Interesting. Yesterday I did a post about Working for the government, which centered on a former US Federal government worker and her stories about what she saw, and I just figured it’s worse in the US than here because we’re smaller and such things would not escape notice.
  
  But given she talked of one employee who started at 6:30am that she found snoring at his desk when she’d arrive at 7:30, and how similar that sounds to this story out of the IRD today, I now wonder whether her other stories have NZ counterparts?
  
  13 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:04am
- Prince
  
  So now IRD must be turned into a psychiatric ward to ensure her ‘safety’. Employ someone else to do the work, provide care facilities, mentors, etc. check up on her outside work hours.
  What a great life these judges have – no need to worry about effective workplaces, budgets, results. It’s all about the vibe.
  
  14 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:10am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Whatever else happens, this woman must be named. Otherwise, it will happen again.
  
  3 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 6:42pm
- NZer In Exile
  
  Didn’t we used to have “sheltered workshops” for people who did stuff like that?
  
  Perhaps if one is so “traumatised” by their past that they are AWOL 75% of the time and simply can’t perform their role, they should work in a sheltered workshop for those with PTSD etc?
  
  4 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:20pm
Benedict Yu

This is an excellent study that looks at the impact of forecast climate change on 56 indicators of human health.

https://earth.org/new-report-highlights-detrimental-impact-of-climate-change-on-human-health/

It is very grim reading. Of course it is now too late to stop these effects.
9 35
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:14am
- NK
  
  Of course it is now too late to stop these effects.
  
  So why are governments here making us poor in a fruitless attempt to do so?
  
  You sound like you’re the cheerleader of Extinction Rebellion.
  
  21 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:40am
  - NK
    
    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/the-country/news/nz-firsts-shane-jones-joins-forces-with-australian-mps-to-fight-woke-banks/T4F5GKEENFCIXPIDS44AR52PLU/
    
    Behind a paywall, but very relevant to this blog post from a few weeks ago: https://nominister.wordpress.com/2025/01/12/debanking-oil-companies-and-the-far-right-watch-out/
    
    5 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 8:42am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      “You sound like you’re the cheerleader of Extinction Rebellion.”
      
      You must be new. You should read my comments on the Zero Carbon Act. There will be over a hundred.
      
      8 8
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 8:48am
      - NK
        
        Fair point. I concede this one.
        
        2 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 10:30am
      - Tom Hunter
        
        The thing is BY, how do you reconcile your scathing commentary about Net Zero and aspects of the renewable energy push, with these articles which come close to the hysterics of “global boiling” and such?
        
        It seems to me that if you accept not just global warming but that it will be bad for humanity, then you have no choice but to accept the crash efforts on massive, fast GHG reductions like Net Zero?
        
        BTW, my stance, going back almost twenty years on this blog. (that 2007 comment was dealing with a Peak Oil fanatic called “Roger Nome”, back when that theory was the wedge used in GHG reduction efforts; “you’ll have no choice because we’re running out of oil”) is as follows:
        
        – Global warming is happening, mainly because of increased GHG emissions (though the models are not complete, see IPCC cloud analysis)
        
        – It’s not a dangerous threat.
        
        – We’d hurt ourselves worse by trying to eliminate fossil fuels as quickly as zealots demand.
        
        – We’re failing to do that anyhow where it counts (see China and India, with Africa next).
        
        – If we did want to do we should have had a crash program on nuclear power two decades ago but the Climate Change movement has resisted that, which means they’re not serious and likely have other motives.
        
        6 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 12:41pm
  - Yvette
    
    Same reason as submissions are being heard and read on the Treaty Principles Bill – and both temporally controlled by one person?
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:20am
- Inandout
  
  BY, you seem of late to be latching onto causes but when you link articles please read further.
  https://earth.org/3-facts-about-californias-climate-that-explain-the-la-fires/
  The LA Mayor and Newsom are actually deplorable, useless and probably criminal in their inaction over a period of time.
  
  12 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:41am
- Chuck Bird
  
  Climate: The Movie
  
  The film that lifts the lid on the climate alarm, and the dark forces behind the climate consensus. Produced by Tom Nelson.
  Written and directed by Martin Durkin. —- Check out our WEBSITE: GORILLA SCIENCE has been set up by rebels from the world of mainstream media. Our aim? To challenge the flagrant lies and double-speak of governments, the media, the educational establishment and others. We are lovers of the scientific method, and a thorn in the side of our corrupt publicly-funded scientific establishment.
  
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDwCUAueLUU
  
  15 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:41am
  - Bridgenag
    
    Would be good if everyone watched that video
    
    7 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 9:16am
- cmm
  
  “Excellent” because it agrees with your biases?
  
  BY: I do not know you or your capabilities, but I assume that you are not a scientist and have only rudimentary scientific knowledge. I also assume that you are a statist as you seem to work in state organisations and I expect therefore you have significant faith in state sectors as good actors.
  
  I put it to you that you are not exactly in a position to characterize what is “excellent” analysis and instead rely on the very poor substitute of believing others, including “experts”.
  
  earth.org is a climate change advocacy group. Their funding depends on climate fear. If you really are believing anything on their website then you really are more naive than I thought you are.
  
  If I have misunderstood your capabilities then I apologise.
  
  30 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:43am
- nova
  
  The full report requires registration to the Lancet, but the summary you have linked to doesn’t seem that impressive in terms of scientific rigour. Just taking the first section:
  
  “Extreme heat is becoming more prevalent and dangerous to human health. Between 2019 and 2023, people were exposed to 46 additional days on average of health-threatening heat than would have been expected without climate change. The report defines “health-threatening” as temperatures above the 84th percentile of the 1986-2005 daily average.”
  
  Is it not possible to analyze this in terms of actual impact on health? The 84th percentile seems a very arbitrary measure, when one would expect that the impact of extreme heat occurs in the top few percent of days, and not the top 15 percent. All this quote is really telling us is that hot days have become more frequent, but doesn’t even go so far as to analyze how often extremely hot days are occurring, or provide any detail on the impact of human health because of this. Maybe the full report does, but everything in that summary seems like a very shallow analysis of the impact of climate change.
  
  13 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:43am
  - Burtland
    
    its the end of January and are still waiting for the hot days
    
    7 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:21pm
  - Chris Nisbet
    
    “people were exposed to 46 additional days on average of health-threatening heat”
    How many people?
    
    5 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 3:11pm
- kowtow
  
  What’s grim is the fear mongering and lies .
  
  The latest of course being the LA fires .
  
  Climate change they tell us .
  
  When it’s literally as simple as one wet period causing an explosive growth in bush , which then dried off and not being managed properly turned into a huge fire hazard .
  
  Oh and of course the growth inpopulations insisting on building in fire prone areas .
  
  If no one built on those hills ( or had proper fire breaks around them) there’d be no insurance “disaster” , as there’d be no one to pay out to.
  
  Many of the fires were the result of arson and in the past to poor maintenance of electricity lines.
  
  This , like the Hawaii fires , a man made disaster of neglect , ignorance and incompetence.
  
  Enjoy the Holocene .
  
  22 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:57am
  - cmm
    
    Correct.
    
    The witch hunt over how the fires started is a deflection and a waste of time. The authorities are just trying to find a scapegoat.
    
    The problem is not fires starting – they start on a daily basis.
    
    The problem is the fires getting out of hand. That is all down to mismanagement. That is multi-layered mismanagement too.
    
    12 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:12am
- Grunter
  
  Oh Dear – Bene, your linked article starts by blaming the current LA fires to climate change. That’s when I bailed out and stopped reading.
  
  It is such obvious propaganda. You have clearly swallowed another big scam pill.
  
  33 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:02am
- Matt Long
  
  The impact of climate forecasts is very real and has cost billions or trillions of dollars already, and done incalculable damage to the mental health of children.
  What is the best response to these forecasts? Ridicule and rebuttal probably, I don’t think they reach the threshold of incitement, perhaps not far off.
  
  16 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:26am
  - kowtow
    
    ML
    
    I’m going to be pedantic here .
    
    Have you noticed how so many in the media now refer to weather reports as “predictions” , even the met reporters themselves do it.
    
    A weather report is based on science and is therefor a “forecast”. They are not predictions , which is what we’d expect clairvoyants etc to do.
    
    But yes when the climate alarmists say “prediction” they are quite right , not based on science , just their faith or belief in Giaism.
    
    Happy to be corrected .
    
    6 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:40pm
    - Matt Long
      
      The reason I used “forecasts” is that the word was used in the post I was replying to.
      Prediction, model, omen, prophecy, prognostication, fantasy, any would do.
      
      1 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 31, 2025 7:10am
- NZer In Exile
  
  “It is very grim reading. Of course it is now too late to stop these effects.”
  
  What to do? Hide under the bed? 😂
  
  Seriously though. You need to get out of the alarmist echo chamber and start listening to real scientists.
  
  4 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 8:21pm
TripeWryter

I committed an act of self-abuse last night: I watched the TVNZ 6pm ‘news’.
I have an excuse, Father. One of the Assembled Intelligence returned to the fold after being away for most of the summer.
He likes to watch the ‘news’.
I was struck by Maiki Sherman’s breathless coverage on Winston Peters and his comments about the thin-skinned, precious little sniveller Ricardo ‘you’re not in Mexico now’ and some other Green immigrant MPs.
All well and good.
I then expected that the next item would cover Mariameno Kapa-Kingi’s racist bullying of another Maori woman – the Children’s Minister, Karen Chhour – but it wasn’t there.
Why was I not surprised?
How is it all right to accuse and insinuate that a Maori is not a proper Maori?
If I or any other Pakeha did that – like say that Debbie Ngarewa-Packer is as Irish as I am – we would be lynched.
How is it that it’s not outrageous?
I said the other day that Karen Chhour has a backbone of titanium – she increasingly makes the Maori Mean Girls and Virginia Andersen, who runs with them, look more and more like midgets.
41 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:17am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Yes,
  I noted that too.
  
  And today we get a continuation of the Return to Mexico, but never an exposé of how the elite Maori view Maori who had the misfortune to grow up in families devoid of “Whanaungatanga”
  
  23 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:31am
- My-Gumboot
  
  Shane Jones comment at the end of this clip
  “it’s a Mexican stand-off”.
  Hilarious..
  https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/shane-jones-resources-minister-on-banks-reducing-services-to-fossil-fuel-businesses-his-comments-to-the-green-party/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=apps
  
  16 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:51am
- Jack5
  
  Prime Minister Luxon seemed to be cut off in microseconds in TVNZ news to give Hipkins space.
  
  10 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:01am
  - Bridgenag
    
    Stopped listening to morning report when they stated that nonsense. Turn the mike down and talk over the answer……..
    
    5 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:44am
Frank the tank

We need a drastic re-engineering of our public service.

In short we need to adopt the US system where an incoming/current government can put in place the correct people for the correct job and ministers/governments are accountable for their own selections.

I suspect when senior management understand it is their job on the line there won’t be any drag nor resistance in adopting the wishes of the people/government.
12 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:19am
NeverMindTheBollocks

Shell Lane (The Terrace) bike rack report:

At 8.20am null bikes once more.

A damp, coolish morning in the Capital, pretty good for cycling.
26 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:22am
- Apteryx
  
  After the excitement of four bikes on one day recently, the bike rack is probably awaiting an engineer’s report to see how it withstood the unexpected loading!
  
  15 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 11:08am
Greenheart

Stuff , this morning,reports on a study of Kauri dieback in the Hunua Ranges by A Te Ngaherehere O Kohukohunui. According to Mr Google that translates to the official name of a forest in NZ. Perhaps Maggie might know about this group and the reliability of their work. My interest is on their findings and their reliability.
Stuff , of course, does not enlighten us.
12 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:26am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  No, I don’t know any of the workers, but it has been undertaken through the Auckland City Council.
  
  (I do know ecologists who have worked for ACC).
  
  It looks to be very well planned and well-conducted standard base-line survey work.
  
  https://www.knowledgeauckland.org.nz/publications/te-ngaherehere-o-kohukohunui-hunua-ranges-kauri-population-health-monitoring-survey/
  
  6 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:44am
Biscuit

Can you guess how far I got into this ‘invite’ before I decided I’d rather be washing my hair that night?:

Vision for Wellington invites you to be part of a provocative, stimulating and uplifting conversation, moderated by award-winning journalist Paddy Gower
36 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:28am
- Bobba Fret
  
  Two words that put me off……”Paddy Gower”
  
  18 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:12am
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    The face for radio
    
    7 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:21pm
- sungsamning
  
  Damm, I’d go. But it clashes with a similar function sponsored by Tards R Us.
  
  16 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:33am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  You still have hair? Some buggers have all the luck!
  
  3 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 6:47pm
Tempist

So is the Green MP on national radio this am complaining about Shane Jones hurty words being an incitement to violence against minorities the same MP chanting from the river to the sea in terrorist cos-play?
28 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:36am
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  Listened to what Peter’s said, he never mentioned race, he never stated divisive rhetoric, he told all the immigrant arrogant Greenies that his family had been here a thousand years, you have just arrived, he bit because these immigrants were whaling at him as if he was was a kauri tree
  
  10 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:25am
  - MCōs
    
    It was Shane Jones who told March to go back to Mexico
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:15am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      They are complaining about two attempts yesterday about suggesting two their Mps have just got here, that’s where the complaint originated from, then went on to remind us about the Mexican thing which was the day before
      
      3 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 12:23pm
    - Jethrod
      
      Bob Jones hit it about right back in late 2020 with this comment about the Mexican…reposted from then
      https://nopunchespulled.com/2020/12/14/a-horrible-green-party-little-turd/
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:44pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  They have no worry supporting the filthy hit job of IDF members may or may not be holidaying innNZ which has lead to things like do you want them dead or alive
  
  5 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 12:24pm
Notsofast

Here is a podcast with aconcise break down of the rise and fall of gender ideology in America.
How the billionaire Pritzker family sponsored Obama into the white house, and how Biden’s friendship with Tim McBride brought the wrecking ball to common sense.
Kara Dansky did her best to save the democrats but failed.

My conclusion is we will never have a left wing government here until they abandon this nonsense, which they can’t.

https://open.spotify.com/episode/5dTZHmmKIQdw6trhvgDdHj?si=6MojAqgFQCiwEpAkIA38ag
6 2
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:39am
Chuck Bird

Jones also does not buy into the climate change hysteria.

Shane Jones labelled ‘racist’ by Greens for yelling ‘send the Mexicans home’ during Parliament debate

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/shane-jones-labelled-racist-by-greens-for-yelling-send-the-mexicans-home-during-parliament-debate/HJV7GQKQ5NB2NKF2FQWFB44PPM/
20 2
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:49am
- kowtow
  
  Those Greens are such pathetic whiners .
  
  ‘Racist ! Protect us!’
  
  And yet they don Arab scarfs and screech genocide.
  
  They don’t like it up ’em.
  
  33 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:00am
- Grunter
  
  10/10 to Jones for calling out the woke banking cartel regards de-banking fossil fuels.
  
  0/10 for his silly comment.
  
  10 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:15am
cas

After that woman from the Maori Party’s comment to Karen Chhour yesterday, I thought of a new name for the party. Te Pati Whakariwi which one of the Maori dictionaries on line says is cruel, unkind, nasty, brutal, vicious, ruthless, harsh, callous.
23 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:02am
NoFax

Deepseek R1 has caused a lot of comment and caused the stock price of Nvidia to fall significantly. The idea was that Deepseek was able to do what OpenAI (ChatGPT) for less than US$6m whereas as OpenAI took near $17b (yes, million vs. billion). Further, it was able to do this on less powerful hardware, particular, GPUs.
However, we should never trust on IT companies’ claims and even more so from China with deep links to the CCP. There are significant issues to address.
First, it’s not open source as some would claim. Huggingface are under taking a project to understand the models used in training as Deepseek didn’t disclose those; no different than OpenAI. So don’t get fooled by the it’s open source canard as it’s not.
Second, and more importantly, there is very good evidence that Deepseek in effect stole the training of the models from OpenAI in a process known as “distillation”. Distillation is a process which is used to train models with an existing model rather than train the model using raw data. It’s useful to create smaller and specialist models but is not a substitute for training models from raw data. And of course, the real cost of AI models and expertise is the training of models. The analogy is the student who studied hard and understands the subject compared to a student that just learnt the answers for the exam.
I’m sure all will come to light over the next few weeks and Deepseek will be sued and blocked from use.
7 2
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:10am
- rangitoto
  
  GothamChess plays Deepseek LoL. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DYMpXkHAUk
  
  2 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:36am
- NothingLeft
  
  For a long and well informed take on implications of Deepseek’s R1: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/hRxGrJJq6ifL4jRGa/deepseek-panic-at-the-app-store
  
  In short:
  1/ with better than 90% cost reduction over previous state of art it will greatly accelerate the coming and pervasive rollout of AGI at low cost as it makes more organizations able to participate in cutting-edge research.
  2/ The development path it sketches out is likely to lead to affordable widely competent AGI in months to years. AI is likely to be smarter than all humans in next 2-3 years.
  3/ It is already verging on smarter than many employed humans on a huge number of tasks, but small enough to run fast on $10k desktop computers (ie cost to run is in low double digit cents per hour).
  4/ it is a lot cheaper to train and run, but relies upon a lot of pre-existing expensive infrastructure investment (staff organization and data center GPU cost hundreds of millions to set up) to do so.
  5/ Has really useful ‘chain of thought’ to show how it arrives at reasoned conclusions. Basically they have created a methodology to allow the AI to self-improve and gain wisdom to go with huge information encoded though thinking through problems and learning from that process the same way that humans do.
  6/ It will only increase demand for Nvidia products (cheaper AI implementation will lead to greater demand).
  
  2 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 2:24pm
  - NoFax
    
    It’s becoming clear that Deepseek did not train their models on raw data as OpenAI. That’s where the cost are; training the models. I can run Llama 3.1 on my laptop (not very fast but for my purposes fast enough). Deepseek, like almost all Chinese companies, stole IP. If you steal it’s always cheaper to sell the stolen goods. This is not the breakthrough that people think it is. It’s a con.
    
    2 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 5:12pm
- Jake Dee
  
  Every new iteration of a technology is going to be at least partially based on the versions before it. that’s not only normal it is desirable. Open AI are going to be looking under the hood of DeepSeek to see what they can learn from it too.
  attempting to block it in the courts just looks like trying to kneecap the opposition rather than running the race.
  It’s a punk move.
  
  1 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 7:04pm
sungsamning

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14338259/Trump-deport-students-college-campus-protests-antisemite.html
Trump launches anti-Semitism Crackdown as he Orders Deportation of pro-Hamas Students who Terrorised Campuses.
President Donald Trump is ordering the deportation of foreign students who took part in pro-Hamas protests on college campuses in the US as he launches a wide-ranging crackdown on anti-Semitism.
A new executive order will target resident aliens – including students with visas – who broke laws during demonstrations following the October 7, 2023 attacks in Israel.
Trump said he would instruct his Justice Department to ‘aggressively prosecute terroristic threats, arson, vandalism and violence against American Jews’. [Yeah, and hell yeah! Go for it Mr president!]
18 2
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:14am
sungsamning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJO3BEJqDOk
Why Is Starmer So Unpopular?
In this video, we’ll take a look at what’s happened since the 2024 general election; why UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is so unpopular; and what this means going forward.
9 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:14am
- mogg
  
  Starmer and [Mod deleted]Ange have managed to commemorate the Holocaust without mentioning the Jews, this is because to do so would offend their 4 million Muslim voters. The UK Labour Government is beneath contempt.
  
  9 3
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 11:19am
  - Ghost
    
    Huh? Have you even bothered to look at what he said? You do realise his wife is Jewish right? Or that his children are being raised with their Jewish culture? Article
    
    From his speech
    
    Earlier this month, my wife and I were in Block 27 of Auschwitz searching for members of her family in the Book of Names. It was harrowing.
    
    ‘We turned page after page after page just to find the first letter of a name. It gave me an overwhelming sense of the sheer scale of this industrialised murder,’ he said.
    
    ‘And every one of those names, like the names we were looking for – was an individual person. Someone’s mother, father, brother, sister brutally murdered, simply because they were Jewish.’
    
    Speech
    
    In Auschwitz, I saw photographs of Nazi guards standing with Jewish prisoners staring at the camera – completely indifferent – and in one case, even smiling. It showed more powerfully than ever how the Holocaust was a collective endeavour by thousands of ordinary individuals utterly consumed by the hatred of difference.
    
    And that is the hatred we stand against today, and it is a collective endeavour for all of us to defeat it.
    
    We start by remembering the six million Jewish victims and by defending the truth against anyone who would deny it. So we will have a National Holocaust Memorial and Learning Centre to speak this truth for eternity.
    
    3 2
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 11:50am
    - mogg
      
      Your attached article is old news, Starmer is well known for his empty rhetoric, having a Jewish wife and children means very little when you look at his past record, he has been a long standing senior member of the Labour Party who under Corbyn with Starmer’s wholehearted support were found guilty of Anti-Semitism by the EHCR. Where Jewish women members of Labour needed bodyguards to attend their national party conference.
      Rayner has very recently put out a statement supported by the Labour Party, it is commemorating the Holocaust without mentioning the Jews,
      
      4 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 3:40pm
      - Ghost
        
        You’ve just told us that he commemorated the Holocaust without mentioning the Jews, which was wrong. Rayner Put out a tweet, it was not a Labour Party statement it was a tweet that said
        
        ‘Tonight, I’m lighting a candle to remember all those who were murdered just for being who they were, and to stand against prejudice and hatred today. Never again.
        
        Prior to that she had spent time with Eve Kugler, who was sent to the USA after experiencing Kristallnacht
        
        https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/holocaust-survivors-shrinking-number-its-34552591
        
        Stop trying to do political hit jobs that are just bullshit smears.
        
        1 3
        Report
        January 30, 2025 3:52pm
    - mogg
      
      HUH,You agree that Rayner who is Deputy PM to Starmer has put out that statement on the Holocaust
      without mentioning the Jews. She is Deputy PM, Starmer is aware but still no comment or rebuke. When the PM or his deputy put out a statement it’s official.
      
      4 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 4:42pm
      - Ghost
        
        There is nothing to rebuke, but perhaps an apology from a small group of people trying to make her tweet, from a remeberance event with 50 holocaust survivors into a political hit
        
        Do you actually know what international holocaust rememberance day is? While a lot of focus is on the Jewish deaths it was set up by the United Nations to remember the genocide of the Jewish people and other minority groups.
        
        Stop trying to make a political smear job out of her tweet.
        
        1 3
        Report
        January 30, 2025 5:22pm
      - mogg
        
        The Holocaust was the extermination of 6 million Jews, yet it’s funny that Deputy PM Rayner and Starmer by his silence cannot remember to say the word Jews.
        
        3 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 5:32pm
      - Ghost
        
        In 2005, the United Nations declared January 27 International Holocaust Remembrance Day. In the resolution, it is stated that every member of the UN should honor the six million Jews as well as those members of other minorities who perished in the Nazi genocide, and to develop educational programs about this history to help prevent such atrocities in the future.
        
        Article
        
        0 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:00pm
  - sungsamning
    
    Yes, they certainly are rubbish. Commemorating the Holocaust without mentioning Jews would call for some creative lying.
    
    4 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 5:53pm
    - Ghost
      
      Problem is this smear is just bullshit
      
      https://mhclgmedia.blog.gov.uk/2025/01/28/holocaust-memorial-day/
      
      She even wrote an article about remembering the Jewish deaths
      
      0 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 6:43pm
Swifty

This man has got it! //

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1A5KDABqT5/?mibextid=wwXIfr

This worries me. Maori wonderfulness has become a cult with self-appointed prophets taking the lead.

“You’re not Maori if you don’t follow the cult and its leaders. The cult has fixes for every human problem. Only Maori can understand or teach the cult’s beliefs. You can’t understand the beliefs except through the cult. You must fully accept all the cult’s beliefs however farcical, fanciful or unsubstantiated they are. You can’t be Maori except through the cult. If you oppose us you’re a racist and a Nazi. If we say whale song fixes Kauri die-back then it is true and saying otherwise is blasphemy. If a Maori says otherwise then they’re not Maori.”

We are entering dangerous and uncharted territory – and I foresee a tremendous lot of Maori being taken advantage of by grifters out to line their pockets with taxpayer cash while setting themselves up as untouchable priests of this new cult.
22 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:26am
- Blog-aholic
  
  When Mariameno Kapa-Kingi speaks like she did to Chhour you know it has now become a cult.
  
  15 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:01am
  - Swifty
    
    I quite agree Blog-aholic.
    
    I must confess to feeling rather unsanitary after reading Kapa-Kingi’s comments yesterday.
    
    Her comments were deeply personal, dehumanising, hurtful and intended to cause harm.
    
    I believe they reveal the seething, boiling river of hatred that flows through the Maori Party currently.
    
    Those comments were unparliamentary and I’m not sure how she is allowed to get away with them.
    
    14 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:25am
- mandk
  
  “I foresee a tremendous lot of Maori being taken advantage of by grifters out to line their pockets with taxpayer cash while setting themselves up as untouchable priests of this new cult.”
  
  What do you mean, you foresee?
  
  You are describing what John Tamihere has done.
  
  9 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 1:21pm
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    And don’t even mention the folks involved with the Kohanga Reo Trust Board
    
    https://thespinoff.co.nz/atea/06-07-2019/can-the-whole-rotten-kohanga-scandal-finally-be-put-to-bed
    
    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/te-manu-korihi/363138/vindication-for-sacked-kohanga-reo-trustee
    
    7 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:15pm
Steve Otto N Shore

The Real Reason Maori Oppose Seymour’s Bill.

Video 49 minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXxweYHNO5Y
8 2
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:39am
I remember when

Jenna Lynch last night.
“No, it is not a pleasant start to the political year.
It’s never pleasant when politics gets personal and this was pretty ugly stuff.”

And Jenna would know unpleasant and ugly stuff!
14 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:44am
imalwaysright

I see the Human Rights Commissioner, Rainbow, has referred the Minto issue to the police.

I hope that while he waits he will investigate Tusiata Avia who published her writings calling for the murder of an entire demographic.
There is no reason why he can’t or shouldn’t.
The writing is still published.
16 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 10:00am
- Ghost
  
  And have you made a complaint to him about it?
  
  5 4
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:07am
  - imalwaysright
    
    There is already a nice thick folder of complaints that have been unresolved, probably many more than the 90 or so he has received about Minto.
    But I will ring the office and let them know that this publication still exists and that I don’t appreciate death threats.
    
    12 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:12am
    - Ghost
      
      The last race relations commented on it, that’s case closed. The real issue here is that the taxpayers funded her rubbish
      
      https://tikatangata.org.nz/news/statement-from-meng-foon-about-poem
      
      5 3
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 10:22am
      - imalwaysright
        
        Agreed.
        What bothered me about Rainbow was him saying that he doesn’t want the Minto case to set a precedent.
        Telling people they aren’t welcome is minor compared with calling for murder, as Avia did.
        I get the impression that Rainbow wants a precedent set that is a relatively low level. That would increase Rainbow’s scope of influence.
        What happens, if Minto is a precedent, when someone takes umbrage to another group, for example Maori, muslims, English , Germans etc, and aren’t allowed to tell them of their view?
        This is lowering the bar and enabling interference in our free speech.
        Free speech isn’t necessarily pleasant. But it is necessary.
        
        5 1
        Report
        January 30, 2025 11:27am
- Skippytony
  
  Swallowing a dead rat here, but I dont think putting Minto’s actions in the hand of the police is the correct path.
  I see these people protesting in Chch wearing their tea towels and calling Israel mass murderers etc.
  I’m obviously missing something here & I’d like to put this question to Mr Minto….”Do you agree its true that armed people crossed into another country and raped and killed unarmed civilians at random, leaving 1000 dead and taking hundreds of hostages?” So, that happened right? I dont care what their justification was for these actions, but its not up for debate that they did it, right?
  So, taking that incident in isolation, do you, Mr Minto, personally condemn that action as an offence against humanity?
  
  Which, of course he will not do – but he should be put on the public record as supporting these actions.
  
  In other words I am saying I think it is better to fight him in the court of public opinion, not diminish our already endangered respect for free speech.
  
  Im sure our host would stand up some kind of on-line Q & A session with Mr Minto…..
  
  9 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 10:52am
  - Tom Hunter
    
    Minto is on-record as praising the Hamas fighters of October 7:
    
    After the resistance fighters broke out from Gaza there was a “second wave” of people who came through the fence and it appears this group were responsible for most of the war crimes committed on that day rather than fighters from the highly-disciplined resistance groups
    
    Thinking like that is how he sleeps at night. He’d have made an excellent scheduler of trains and other factory processes.
    
    9 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 12:56pm
  - Burtland
    
    an interview with Basem Naim, a leader in Hamas’ politburo, on BBC Hardtalk
    – the guy has a PhD in surgery but is largely incoherent and wont condemn 7th Oct
    
    https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3ct5t5c
    
    1 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 1:33pm
Chuck Bird

The audio is 6 minutes.

“It’s a Mexican stand-off”: Shane Jones unrepentant for comments about Green MPs

https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/shane-jones-resources-minister-on-banks-reducing-services-to-fossil-fuel-businesses-his-comments-to-the-green-party/
11 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 10:02am
- Jules99
  
  I know loads of people who have no idea how many foreign born people we have in parliament. They are often surprised to hear that there is a Mexican there. I’m glad NZF are raising awareness of this. I personally feel that all MPs should win the vote of an electorate who can decide for themselves if a foreign-born person can represent their interests. With list MPs, we don’t get a say.
  
  10 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 12:31pm
  - MCōs
    
    I don’t think Andy Foster would be so keen on that idea
    
    0 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 3:39pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    I think you’ll find there are two Mexicans in our Parliament.
    
    1 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 7:00pm
Scooter

I was listening to the Treaty Principles Bill submissions by Sandra Goudie (I didn’t know of her before but gave a good speech), then basically being attacked at the end of her speech by Rawiri Waititi and Tamatha Paul who asked what qualified her to talk about Maori, Waititi then yells out “it’s your privilege”. To his credit the chair Meager puts Waititi in his place but it just shows you he’s a loud mouth bully not just in parliament.
18 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 10:10am
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  They will hate Meager as well, he is part Māori and probably has more Maori than many of TPM members
  
  9 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 12:28pm
  - MCōs
    
    It ain’t the meat, it’s the motion
    It ain’t the meat, it’s the movement
    It ain’t the meat, it’s the action
    
    0 3
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 4:11pm
    - All_on_Red
      
      When someone says ‘ cheerio’ to you are they saying goodbye?
      Or something else
      
      3 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:58pm
- AitchW
  
  TMP are not coming out of this select committee looking good. They have confirmed themselves as bullies, racists, bigots and not especially intelligent.
  
  5 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 5:17pm
sirknz

What the hell are we apologising for?

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/new-zealand-apologises-for-failing-to-consult-pacific-countries-on-rse-worker-changes/6AHENRKQP5FAVJ6TMGJVVE3MQQ/

If we want to change the settings, we change the settings. The only consultation should be “these are the rules for this scheme, abide by them or we find someone else who will.”.
16 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 10:50am
- thirteenstars
  
  NZ is in the unenviable position of keeping a large number of Pacific island countries happy because of one thing: China.
  
  If only we had a couple of large allies with similar interests in the Pacific with whom we could develop a robust common regional policy…
  
  8 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 11:09am
- RoboRob
  
  100% we set our policy. If you want to be an RSE worker you abide by them or not. If the changes mean less RSE workers then we need, well thats our problem. No apologies needed.
  
  Toughen up FFS.
  
  8 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 11:28am
- David Garrett
  
  sirknz: Most New Zealanders probably don’t realise what a profound impact the RSE scheme has on Pacific economies, including Tonga where I live most of the time.
  
  It feels a little odd to be agreeing with Phil Twyford, but I do – it is simple politeness to liaise with the countries from which we draw our labour to do jobs the lazy arse bastards on the dole won’t do.
  
  6 2
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 1:04pm
  - MCōs
    
    Here’s an explanation from an American which probably applies here too
    “I won’t hire Americans. They don’t want to work. A guy from Guatemala, El Salvador, or Mexico will work hard all day; American’s won’t. These guys take pride in their work, and they’re as honest as it gets—I’d trust them with anything. Americans don’t want to get their hands dirty.”
    
    3 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 4:32pm
    - BananaLlama
      
      You should see some of the housing disasters that companies using immigrant labour have been responsible for. I would be very skeptical when buying a new home if i was living in America right now.
      
      4 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:06pm
    - Conservatarian
      
      Does he distinguish whether he checks the immigration status of these workers? Because if he employs illegals, Tom Homan needs the address of his workplace.
      
      4 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:13pm
      - MCōs
        
        Would you dob him in would you?
        Because the workers didn’t have the correct visas or because the big boss was ripping them off?
        
        2 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:00pm
    - All_on_Red
      
      The vast majority of Illegal Immigrants go to the cities not the countryside.
      Its estimated that only 1% of them work in farming
      Most of the immigrants working on farms come in under the US Alien Workers program
      ‘The H-2A temporary agricultural program allows agricultural employers who anticipate a shortage of domestic workers to bring nonimmigrant foreign workers to the U.S. to perform agricultural labor or services of a temporary or seasonal nature.’
      
      Of course the ‘caring’ (sarc) left are quite happy to exploit illegals to do their gardens and clean their houses and pay them below minimum wage. Hypocrites
      
      5 1
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:48pm
      - MCōs
        
        There was no reference to the workers being illegal immigrants in that quote and it wasn’t the point anyway
        
        1 2
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:20pm
      - Jack5
        
        Temporary labour schemes’ worth-while side: providing aid to Pacific countries in a dignified way and keeping cost of fruit down in NZ supermarkets.
        
        Bad side: this lower-cost labour drags on productivity. Rising labour costs drive innovation and are pressure for better productivity.
        
        The best way for NZ to benefit from temporary work scheme would be for New Zealanders working in Australia, especially if our big neighbour axes visa-free entry from this country.
        
        1 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:25pm
      - All_on_Red
        
        MCos
        You have posted multiple times articles about how farming would suffer if illegals were rounded up- which is wrong
        
        3 0
        Report
        January 30, 2025 6:33pm
  - Hugh Jarse
    
    Agree David, I have seen the positive impact in the Solomons, Vanuatu and Tonga myself. It has also been of huge benefit to fruit and vege growers, vineyards etc in NZ, some churches in rural areas have also benefited from the increased attendance and great singing of the RSE workers !
    
    2 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 10:22pm
Apteryx

Oh dear, climate change ignorance on show again. Wellington’s mayor Tory Whanau is lauding the giving of ratepayers’ money to support “projects helping to reduce the city’s carbon emissions”.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360562985/wellington-suburbs-eye-world-first-climate-action

She says the fund has has been a success because it’s allocated $700,000 in less than three years. Yes, spending money is the lefty measure of success. Outcomes and results are so right-wing.

The money has gone to groups working on things like bike repair programmes, waste management and community gardens. “All of their efforts are making a difference”, she said, pointing out how recent floods and the LA forest fires have brought climate change to the forefront of Wellingtonian’s minds.

No, what is at the forefront of Wellingtonians’ minds is the 50% rates hike in her first term.

Has Whanau heard of the ETS? Has the reporter Emma Rickets? If so, why not ask some pertinent questions? Will Ngaio and Crofton Downs becoming carbon neutral stop fires in LA or floods in Auckland? Is it possible for a suburb to become carbon neutral by holding a recycling day and having 50 households run a ‘carbon calculator’?

Please don’t say that Wellingtonians deserve this. The majority don’t, and didn’t vote for this mayor.
16 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 11:07am
- All_on_Red
  
  Climate change caused the California fires?
  Really?
  ‘The cause of the Eaton fire, which burned through the area of Altadena killing 17 people, has been a matter of discussion since it started exactly three weeks ago on Jan. 7. Within days, there was video and photos suggesting the fire started beneath a power transmission tower operated by Southern California Edison (SCE).’
  https://hotair.com/john-s-2/2025/01/28/new-evidence-on-the-cause-of-the-eaton-fire-n3799266
  Its pretty cool how they found out how it occurred.
  
  6 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 5:55pm
thirteenstars

Hollywood Reporter:

New York magazine is on the defensive over its most recent issue’s cover, which paints a picture of an all-white celebration in Washington, D.C. on the eve of President Donald Trump’s inauguration but was revealed to have been cropped to cut out several Black attendees at the event.
…
The issue’s lead article, by Brock Colyar, is headlined “The Cruel Kids’ Table” which is emblazoned on the cover with a lead-in reading: “Out late with the young right as they contemplate cultural domination.”

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/new-york-magazine-black-partygoers-trump-inauguration-tiktok-1236120834/

Here’s the unedited photo:

https://pyxis.nymag.com/v1/imgs/283/2ca/3e4488bd4aad53e2fe28fc2c3a0cbf59f2-mp-GALADC0339.rhorizontal.w1100.jpg

This is exactly what TVNZ, Stuff, etc., serve up on a daily basis. They lie by omission. They edit very creatively, and they pursue an editorial policy that is dedicated to making the story fit their ideology.
27 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 12:30pm
- graham
  
  I regret I can only give one uptick. Your last paragraph nails it absolutely.
  
  12 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 12:56pm
- Libertarians are right
  
  It’s actually worse than that. The word “Table” seems to be deliberately placed to cover up a black guy in the photo they show.
  It gets even worse – the guy who actually hosted the party is black!
  
  9 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 1:13pm
- Inandout
  
  thirteen, my eyes were drawn to a certain cleavage and I may have missed the black chaps.
  
  5 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 5:21pm
  - thirteenstars
    
    Sure, that’s perfectly understandable. Good thing is it is a real cleavage upon a woman who is actually a woman.
    
    3 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 7:32pm
Yvette

Karoline Leavitt, the new White House press secretary — at 27, the youngest person ever to hold the job — kicked off her first briefing on Tuesday afternoon by reminding all the veteran reporters in assembly that they had become more irrelevant than ever. “Americans’ trust in mass media has fallen to a record low,” she said right off the top.
Twisting the knife, she added: “Millions of Americans — especially young people — have turned from traditional television outlets and newspapers.”
The place was packed with network television anchors and rumpled newspaper reporters who had been slinging questions around that cramped room since before Ms. Leavitt learned to walk or talk (which would have been sometime toward the end of the Clinton presidency). Smiling, ever-so-sweetly, she told the old-timers they’d have to make room for all the flashy new bloggers, influencers, “content creators” and podcasters she planned to invite to her briefings on a regular basis. It was, she said, high time that the White House “adapt” to the “new media landscape” – NYT subscription

“MSM, ask Winston not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee”
10 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 12:54pm
- MCōs
  
  Winston is getting more grumpy by the day with the usual band of reporters
  However
  I saw him on TikTok the other day with that big grin we all know and love.
  A couple of young Māori boys saw him in the street and asked what sort of skin care routine he used because they’d known him all their lives and he never looked any older.
  
  7 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 3:53pm
  - AitchW
    
    Whisky is good for the skin.
    
    6 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 5:14pm
    - All_on_Red
      
      “You’re soaking in it”
      
      Some will recognise the reference.
      
      5 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 5:57pm
thirteenstars

Trumps EO about birthright citizenship seems very similar to NZ’s citizen by birth requirements:

Trump EO:

…no department or agency of the United States government shall issue documents recognizing United States citizenship… (1) when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth, or (2) when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States was lawful but temporary, and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/protecting-the-meaning-and-value-of-american-citizenship/

NZ’s policy:

You are only a citizen if, when you were born, at least 1 of your parents was:

–a New Zealand citizen, or
–had a visa that allowed them to reside in New Zealand indefinitely.

https://www.govt.nz/browse/passports-citizenship-and-identity/nz-citizenship/types-of-citizenship-grant-birth-and-descent/

Yet we see stories and opinions in this country that Trump has got it wrong, and that the policy is cruel. In fact before 2006 we had the same birthright citizenship policy that the US currently does, and we saw fit to change it, just as Trump is attempting to do.
11 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 12:54pm
- Libertarians are right
  
  The problem is their Constitution, more accurately the 14th Amendment. Regardless of whether everyone agrees with a law change, it has to be done through a Constitutional Amendment.
  
  Having said that, there are two factors involved: being born in the US AND being subject to US jurisdiction. So the question is what does it mean to be subject to US jurisdiction?
  
  The closest case to a precedent here was from the 1890s when a Man of Chinese heritage, born to parents who were legally in the country under the equivalent of a Green Card was deemed to be a US citizen.
  
  It has never been tested for the child of people without permanent residency.
  
  6 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 1:22pm
  - thirteenstars
    
    The Constitution is not necessarily the problem. Policy and law have to be written to enforce any amendment. This requires interpretation and it’s the role of the Supreme Court to adjudicate on differences in interpretation. Ultimately it’s the role of Congress to settle intractable problems if the court proves incapable.
    
    Recent history with Roe v Wade shows us that a decades-old judgment thought to be almost sacrosanct was found to be in error.
    
    The EO does not do away with birthright citizenship it simply places reasonable limits on it, and as with NZ law it seems perfectly reasonable and not a violation of any citizen’s rights to require at least one parent have a substantial existing legal relationship with the United States.
    
    7 1
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 2:41pm
    - Allan
      
      Exactly. The ammendment came about after the civil war when it was attempted to stop the children of slaves from becoming citizens because their parents weren’t citizens. The ammendment also says that it wants the children of immigrants to be equal citizens.
      
      A deeper analysis of the ammendent and surrounding discourse substantiallly undermines the idea that everyone born in the US is automatically a citizen.
      
      The 1898 case, United States v Wong Kim Ark is what is being used to justify citizen ship to anybody who gives birth while in the US.
      
      The precedent has never been tested against illegal aliens. But looks like it soon will be.
      
      4 0
      Log in to Reply
      Report
      January 30, 2025 6:04pm
Chuck Bird

Two interesting clips of Shane Jones and Jane Smith on The Country interviewed by Jamie Mackay.

https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1049-the-country-28628176/episode/the-country-300125-shane-jones-talks-262631322/

https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1049-the-country-28628176/episode/the-country-300125-jane-smith-talks-262630558/
0 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 2:24pm
Chuck Bird

Why does the media not ask some questions on this?

Luxon’s credibility on the line with tomorrow’s climate target announcement

“Treasury estimate that the Ardern/Shaw-era 2030 targets will cost Kiwi taxpayers up to $24 billion – that’s twelve Dunedin hospitals or $12,000 for every New Zealand household.”

https://www.taxpayers.org.nz/climate_target_announcement_jan25
11 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 3:04pm
Bobba Fret

The Greens are very quick to moan about increasing speed limits, but their members can’t even do basic safety correctly.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-apologises-for-not-wearing-seatbelt-in-cab/CSTIYBDO2VBWVEYHXJ3CRVAQLI/
I wonder how many people die from not wearing a seat belt?
13 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 3:16pm
- mandk
  
  A lot of people who have crashes when they are speeding die because they are not wearing seat belts, not because of the speed per se.
  
  A lot of them are also young hoodlums and / or people driving while drugged or under the influence of alcohol.
  
  9 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 3:42pm
  - AitchW
    
    Very true. My nephew was killed when he was thrown from a car crashed by a drunk driver. He (the nephew) was not wearing a seatbelt. The driver walked away mostly unhurt.
    Silly bugger should not have got in the car, just another bad decision by a teenager.
    
    9 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 5:13pm
- rangitoto
  
  Why wasn’t he walking or using a bicycle?
  
  13 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 3:48pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Question of the day
    
    3 0
    Log in to Reply
    Report
    January 30, 2025 7:09pm
- mandk
  
  Cabs are actually less environmentally friendly than private cars.
  
  Excluding the drivers (who are often only going from place to place looking for fares) their average occupancy (of people actually going somewhere) is less than one.
  
  Greens should definitely not ride in cabs.
  
  9 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 4:17pm
- AitchW
  
  He/they/zi/banana has/have/hoot no need to apologise. The rules don’t apply to Green MPs doncha know?
  
  5 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 5:11pm
- All_on_Red
  
  I noticed this in the article
  ‘Green Party musterer Ricardo Menéndez March said it would not happen again.’
  
  Musterer?
  Well, I guess a Green MP is as dumb as a sheep
  
  6 1
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 5:40pm
Sir Henry Morgan

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/kiwiburger-packaging-error-mcdonalds-nz-apologises-for-typo/DNSHNHEU4RGMJFPWTRZUI37TEE/

Who else guessed from the headline (before reading the article) that the big piece of news would be a missing macron?

I did.

My deductive process ran as follows.

First, in New Zealand’s third-rate newspapers a typo could only be deemed ‘news’ because some activist desperately wanted it thus. After all, it’s not like the newspapers themselves are not full of typos. So chances are the typo relates to Maori (“Te Reo” if you’re a member of the groovy gang), with the article being activism dressed up as ‘news’.

Second, any typo in Maori that goes unnoticed for two years probably involves a macron. Macrons only recently became de rigueur, and many people remain more accustomed to Maori written without macrons. So even if the company had someone fluent in Maori check the packaging they could still find themselves in the ‘news’.
9 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 5:01pm
lifesgood

Schools whinging about school lunches being late. FFS what have these kids eaten for the last 7 weeks? It’s another bloody rort.
11 1
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 6:08pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  It’s not as if it’s compulsory to eat the provided lunch.
  
  6 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:07pm
Swifty

Doesn’t Tama Potaka know that stacking civic bodies with your political mates is the sole preserve of the Left!

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360564944/insult-maori-waitangi-tribunal-appointment-scorned

Just because the Left do it doesn’t mean that Right can do it too!

//
3 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 8:15pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  That’s the bugger of a Partnership…sometimes you have to put up with folks who don’t want to do things your way.
  
  5 0
  Log in to Reply
  Report
  January 30, 2025 9:05pm
Jack5

Mount ~~Egmont~~ Taranaki today joined the Whanganui River and a national park each as a “legal person”.

This came with Parliament passing the Taranaki Maunga Collective Redress Bill, and making an apology for seizing Maori land.

The bill pretty much expunges the name “Mt Egmont”. It is now Taranaki Maunga, or by its now “legal personhood title” Te Kāhui Tupu.

“Legal personhood” is a device promoted by Chris Finlayson, former National Minister and one-time Ngai Tahu settlement negotiator. It was bestowed on Whanganui River 2017, then on Te Urewera national park.

This followed Ecuador in 2008 recognisng the legal personhood of Nature, or Pachamama.

Red Radio reports Taranaki tribal chief executive Wharehoka Wano saying he is confident the mountain name Egmont will be phased out.

“When I was back in the 80s, Egmont was only the name it was really known by out of the Māori community. But now there’s more non-Māori that are applying Taranaki as the rightful name and not Egmont, and another generation will flush that out again.

“At the moment, Taranaki is the ancestral mountain, our ancestor, and our descendants believe it’ll always be Taranaki.”

So the renaming of New Zealand continues.

My preference would have been have both: Maori names in the Maori language, traditional English-language names in English. The fact that Maori want one name in both languages perhaps suggests they acknowledge continuing primacy of the English language.

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/540431/taranaki-maunga-becomes-a-legal-person-as-treaty-settlement-passes-into-law
2 0
Log in to Reply
Report
January 30, 2025 9:42pm

Add a Comment Cancel reply

Login to comment or vote

« What a change from the days of Governor Brash

2 million US public servants offered redundancy »

Donations

You can now donate to Kiwiblog

Exclusive content from DPF on Patreon

Become a Patron!

Never miss a post

Email Address

Join 40.4K other subscribers

Highlights

Target achieved II
Good progress on attendance
Health Target 5 – elective treatments
Health Target 4 – Specialist appointments

Links

The hidden power within children: "an intense motivation to perceive reality"
Not PC
Jackal: Ray Chung – Arsehole of the week
The Standard
Creepy Jealous Ray Chung gets Wang Chunged tonight
The Daily Blog
Expanding the Milei Miracle: Labor Market Deregulation
Utopia
My Dream Is Coming True
No Minister
Word of the day
Hompaddock
Is there a relationship between marriage rates and welfare dependence?
Point of Order
Forum 2025 speakers Dr Miriam Grossman / Israel & Maria Folau
Bob McCoskrie's McBlog
Gas is still dead
No Right Turn
NRL Predictions for Round 19
Stats Chat
The State of Local Government
NZCPR
Careful what you wish for.
Kiwipolitico
41 questions
Croaking Cassandra
Social media slippery slopes
Offsetting Behaviour
THE WORKING FROM HOME RACKET BY PUBLIC SERVANTS
No Punches Pulled (Bob Jones)
Tory Whanau may have to sell Wellington mayoralty to make ends meet
The Civilian
The Accidental Engagement
Imperator Fish
Making this movie might have been a mistake
Liam Hehir
Why I am retiring from political blogging
Kiwi FireWalker
Angie Warren-Clark: Meet the Newbies
Dan Moskovitz

[email protected]

PO Box 12270, Thorndon, Wellington 6144

Facebook
Twitter
FourSquare
Instagram
LinkedIn
Google+

Archives
Disclosure Statement
Editorial Policy
Privacy Policy
Complaints Policy
Comments Policy

Design by cre8d

%d

Share this:

Like this: