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March 31, 2025 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 31 March 2025

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General Debate

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NeverMindTheBollocks

Sending rockets into space burns a lot of fuel. Does Rocket Lab have to buy carbon credits? If not, why not?
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March 31, 2025 8:03am
- Mike
  
  Do you buy carbon credits for the fuel you burn in your car?
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:56am
  - Michael Johnston
    
    Yes, we all do. The credit is purchased by fuel companies and passed on to consumers at the pump. I assume the same principle applies to rocket fuel.
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:18pm
- Spam
  
  I expect that the fuel they buy has a carbon charge attached, like when you or I purchase petrol.
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:59am
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    No, international travel is regulated under international rules under ICAO. So your petrol bought here has a carbon charge included. Your aviation fuel doesn’t (yet) because it is burned in international aviation zones.
    
    I imagine space fuel is fairly similar – outside our jurisdiction, therefore exempt.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:41pm
- artemisia
  
  Is that a reason to launch from the US?
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:19am
  - cmm
    
    I suspect there are huge tax/subsidy advantages in launching from USA.
    Quite likely there are also security issues too as the US site is intended to mainly, if not exclusively, launch US government payloads.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:08am
  - mandk
    
    I heard Peter Beck talking about this a couple of months ago.
    
    He explained that Rocket Lab could not launch the new Neutron vessels from NZ because a single launch would require the entire stock of liquid oxygen in NZ and, even then, the rocket would only be half-fueled.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:35am
    - sungsamning
      
      Damm, looks like I’ll have to move to Florida then -;)
      
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      March 31, 2025 4:55pm
- Phronesis
  
  International aviation is excluded from the NZ ETS.
  
  Only CO2 produced in countries full of idiots dumb enough to think their CO2 is particularly evil is taxed.
  
  CO2 produced over the sea, or in China, or most of the world really, isn’t taxed.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:28am
- imalwaysright
  
  If they could get the rocket to do a few laps of the wineries and orchards in the Hawkes Bay I’m sure the growers would pay his costs in return for the crop dusting of fertiliser.
  
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  March 31, 2025 11:11am
- the deity formerly known as nigel6888
  
  No, probably not – who would they pay the $$ to? The fuel is not burned in NZ territory, and therefore not governed by NZ law.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:42pm
- Rumblestrip
  
  The Rocket Lab Electron contains roughly 1.6 tonnes of refined kerosene. When burned this will produce around 500 kilograms of CO2.
  
  Therefore, carbon credits for one launch will cost… [drum roll please]… somewhere around $30.
  
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  March 31, 2025 4:37pm
kowtow

Wow , a really detailed article by David Fisher in today’s Herald on the background police/security to and fro texting concerning ex Green MP Golriz Gharaman’s stop and question at Pak n Sav Royal Oak .

What a non story !

When there’s such other rich pickings .

Which if it were the Blue or Yellow team , they’d be all over . Innuendo and all.
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March 31, 2025 8:08am
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  They are silent on another green issue as well
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:59am
  - kowtow
    
    Plunket and Peters weren’t silent on it .
    
    The latest podcast on the Platform is most instructive.
    
    It will go mainstream soon.
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:25am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      Greens lying saying it was his kid, but there was pics of 3 different t kids
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:13pm
  - Conservatarian
    
    I understand Fisher also has a “non-binary” child so is heavily invested in carrying on this nonsense (thus he can’t be seen calling for investigation into Doyle)
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:29pm
- JamesP
  
  It emerged during Herald inquiries that Ghahraman was facing questions over an item worth $40 which store security did not find in her shopping or shopping bag.
  So where was it concealed?
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:20am
- Tauhei Notts
  
  Kowtow, it is almost as if the Greens’ cheer squad are trying divert attention from the real scurrilous male.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:44am
  - Notsofast
    
    About whom Winston just completed a long form interview on The Platform with Sean Plunkett.
    No doubt it will be on YouTube presently.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:09am
  - grumpy
    
    Nah nah nah nah nah nah I CAN’T HEAR YOU!!!!
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:15am
  - Scooter
    
    How dare you, it’s a they, them.
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:00am
  - Handyman
    
    And… right on schedule…
    Greens painting Doyle as a victim of misinformation and hate.
    Swarbrick says the post does not count as it was before he was an MP. But it was after being vetted as morally suitable to be a high ranking Green MP (maybe she got that right) and whilst standing for Parliament.
    Compare her comments re Uffendell about an incident when he was a child.
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:31pm
    - sirknz
      
      Yeah, I find that there are very few people who don’t get angry at what they perceive to be overt, or covert, sexualisation of children. The ones that don’t get angry over that sort of thing tend to be the ones I would want to keep away from the kids in my family any way.
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:07pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      Swarbrick looked gutted, she will know this is true
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:15pm
- Mod88
  
  Stuff running puff-piece(s) on Tamatha Paul this morning too. Collusion much and cover for their chosen favourites. No wonder Trust in the Mainstream Media is so low and crashing.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:50am
- grumpy
  
  Diversion????
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:16am
- Ghost
  
  There is a term going around that some think means something else than it does
  
  Perhaps this article is worth reading
  
  https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/brief-history-word-bussy-140830238.html
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:35am
  - Keith White
    
    The GreenGays: We are proud our colleague used this word because we approve its meaning and context just so very much!
    
    Also the GreenGays: How dare you use / quote this word in the context and meaning that our colleague used it in!
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:54pm
    - muzled
      
      Surely they meant gaygrenes rather than gangrenes?
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:38pm
  - sirknz
    
    Apparently it might be a slur according to Swarbrick. I’ve seen a lot of words used as slurs but never ‘bussy’, it has only ever meant the back passage..
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:55pm
  - Bevan
    
    Bussy in gay slang refers to a boy pussy, aka an orifice used during gay male sexual intercourse. In that context, maybe someone needs to ask Chloe if she would be comfortable if a straight white male MP posted a picture of himself with a young female and mentioned his cock.
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:27pm
    - Keith White
      
      Chloe would be resolutely at ease with that scenario as long as the post was by a pale, pseudomale Green MP. Otherwise, “burn him at the stake!”
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:59pm
- Keith White
  
  ‘Innuendo’, kt? ISWYDT…
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:09pm
- Bevan
  
  Golriz broke the law, she is not the victim here! Only in NZ can someone break the law and be a victim in the eyes of NZ journalists!
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:26pm
Bridgenag

Sunday Strip: Time to Change
The things we cannot accept.

Great DOGE interview. Retirement paperwork on paper……..

“Elon Musk and DOGE team give behind the scenes look at their mission

This is a fascinating interview – and worth watching in its entirety. It is 40 minutes long and decidedly not funny, but important.”

https://open.substack.com/pub/rwmalonemd/p/sunday-strip-time-to-change?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
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March 31, 2025 8:08am
- Mark Hanley
  
  Expect to see the NZ version of Doge in the next budget.
  
  The eonomy is growing so a controlled ridding of the public service’s excess 16000+ workers can and will begin.
  
  And the supermarkets are finally getting a shake up.
  
  Do not underestimate the political difficulty of taking on a duopoly awash with cash.
  
  They won’t go quietly which could explain the “get Luxon” BS in the discredited and unpopular NZ press.
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:43am
  - RoboRob
    
    Why do we need to wait until the budget for NZ Doge? Where has this group been for the last year? The government announced its 6% accross the board cuts immediately on election but there has been NO real action since, except Seymour saving $150m on school lunches.
    
    FWIW and I hope I am wrong, IF NZ Doge is announced it will be a different beast entirely. It will be a ‘working group’ that will spend a year, perhaps 18 mths, and then release a report with suggested areas to cut expenses. The Government isn’t going to want to be acting on that report in an election year, so nothing will happen. It will allow the government to talk about how they are making targetted cuts though, and we all know thats whats most important!
    
    Lets face it, there are plenty of government departments and are obviously not required, if the government was serious they could be closed almost immediately. Instead we continue to appoint ‘woman’s, Maori, children’s, PI, indigenous peoples, disabilities etc’ commissioners, whose job is to put out occasional press releases.
    
    p.s. Dissatisfaction with Luxon is not a supermarket plot, thats wishful thinking. My wife complained about him this morning and she has NO interest in politics.
    
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    March 31, 2025 9:04am
    - Mark Hanley
      
      Do not underestimate the mess left behind by the Ardern, Clark, Hipkins, Robertson, Hipkins, Blomfield axis of evil. They hadn’t even funded Pharmac! The organisation responsible for millions of NZers lives.
      
      Add in the deep and long rescession required to tame inflation created by the axis of evil and you have yourself a complex management challenge which took an incredible amount of resource, expertise, and yes…. TIME to sort out.
      
      Don’t be fooled by the despicable NZ media…. you’ve never read headlines like…..
      “Maori activists are upset because Dr Elizabeth Rata has overseen the elimination of Maori mumbo jumbo from the curriculum.”
      
      Anyone who manged anything will understand analyzing problems properly then assessing, devising, planning, and implementing quality solutions takes time. Prioritization is required when you have limited resource, and timing actions in the correct part of the economic cycle is crucial for Success.
      
      So be patient and encourage Mrs Rob to read my balanced and factual posts….. she may just change her mind…
      
      and If she does her future and the future of your offspring will certainly be brighter!
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:52am
      - NK
        
        To you, Luxon & Willis are no different to Trump: They could stand in Lambton Quay and shoot people and you’d be here saying how they shot people better than Labour would have.
        
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        March 31, 2025 10:58am
      - pdm
        
        `So be patient and encourage Mrs Rob to read my balanced and factual posts….. she may just change her mind…’
        
        Self opinionated in the extreme!!
        
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        March 31, 2025 11:48am
      - cmm
        
        “Do not underestimate the mess left behind by the Ardern, Clark, Hipkins, Robertson, Hipkins, Blomfield axis of evil. ”
        
        You don’t have to convince us.
        
        You need to convince the 40,000 people who are leaving every year.
        
        For them it does not matter who made the mess. What matters is when the mess is going to be fixed up.
        
        Saying it is Cindy’s fault does not count for anything. Luxon has taken the job of fixing it up. He needs to tell people the how and when of that ASAP.
        
        “So be patient” No bullshit. Why should they? They have already been patent for 18 months.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:14pm
      - cmm
        
        Bugger. I gave you an uptick by mistake.
        
        Don’t let it go to your head.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:15pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        See CMM…. Even you are subconsciously changing your mind after reading my factual balanced posts.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:26pm
      - Dave
        
        Following the reference to Elizabeth Rata, I ended up here:
        
        https://e-tangata.co.nz/comment-and-analysis/ideology-is-pushing-maori-knowledge-out-of-the-curriculum/
        
        If only I had seen this this morning, I could have asked the two Indian plumbers and the Chinese electrician working on the extension how the incorporated Te Tiriti and matauranga Maori in their work, what role they had played in their training, giving parity to Maori knowledge. Too late!
        
        As for Ms Moss’s final paragraph desiring that our curriculum ‘better reflect who we are as a society’, 35 years ago I pointed out to education officials that biculturalism, dividing NZers into Maori and non-Maori – as if that last is a meaningful cultural, ethnic or educational category, did not reflect my experience as a teacher in schools where 33-65% of the pupils were neither Maori or European. Little did I dream that accompanying this wave of cultural essentialism would be a rejection of modernity and the enlightenment.
        
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        March 31, 2025 2:41pm
      - RoboRob
        
        FYI Mrs Rob wasn’t complaining about budget cutting or anything policy based. She watched an interview with Luxon (TV1) and said he comes across like a robot, unable to answer questions.
        
        This was with no prompting from me as I didn’t see the interview or even know about it until she raised it. She said ‘it must be bad because I am talking about it’.
        
        Unfortunately no level of quality management, which I hope National are providing, will help with the views of Woman like her. Luxon, as good a manager as he may be, is not resonating with the voting public. As witnessed by someone as useless as Hipkins beating a sitting PM in the preferred PM poll.
        
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        March 31, 2025 2:57pm
      - Pope Punctilious II
        
        Did you forget the mess left behind by Key?
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:53pm
  - imalwaysright
    
    Overseas supermarkets won’t be keen to set up in a country where people can walk out without paying.
    
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    March 31, 2025 9:23am
    - Mark Hanley
      
      True. Another example of the multi faceted, time consuming, and costly solutions required to solve seemingly simple problems.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:35am
    - cmm
      
      Nor a country where there are close to zero customers.
      
      It costs billions to set up a supermarket. There isn’t a huge amount of profit in it.
      
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      March 31, 2025 12:16pm
      - NK
        
        [Mod – debate without the personal rubbish]. He’s on the side of the Greens, believing (without foundation) that the supermarkets are making “super profits”.
        
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        March 31, 2025 2:13pm
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        24 billion annually for the 2 players
        
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        March 31, 2025 6:21pm
      - John Loveridge
        
        Supermarkets are a high cost, high volume, low margin business. An enormous support back-end is required. As cmm says, it would require billions to set up another chain. It simply isn’t a viable or attractive proposition for any potential competitor.
        
        Besides, Aussies seem to get by with two-and-a-bit supermarket chains, and they aren’t having a big cry about lack of competition.
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:02pm
    - Grunter
      
      Nor a country where the central Govt is threatening to forcefully make them split up their wholesale and retail activities. Who would do that?
      
      One of Aldi’s core strengths is it’s global buying power and streamlined logistics (wholesaling). They are not going to look at NZ favorably.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:10pm
      - RoboRob
        
        Willis wants to be seen to be doing something. Nothing she is doing will make a multinational supermarket chain setup here. If they were going to they would already be here.
        
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        March 31, 2025 2:59pm
      - Don Beckett
        
        The “Duopoly” is too well distributed and the market is too small to attract another player in the supermarket field, let alone our slack laws that prevent thieves from being taken into custody, even if physical restraint is necessary.
        I also wonder they will get land to build on without appropriate koha, or tolerate waiting years for approval to build.
        
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        March 31, 2025 3:03pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      They are no longer allowed too
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:20pm
  - cmm
    
    [Mod – just debate the topics]
    
    If there really is a DOGE coming to NZ, then why not tell everyone now? Why keep it secret for a whole year?
    
    Every day we have about 120 high value people leaving NZ (40,000 per year). The only way to stop this loss is to give them some hope that the future is going to get better.
    
    If there really is a plan then share it, because those 40,000 people need a reason to stay.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:13am
    - RoboRob
      
      Becuase, they have only just decided to do it!
      
      I am sure thet meeting went something like….
      
      ‘Hey guys were are really struggling in the polls. We need a popular policy to regain momentum. People in the US seem to like the Doge thing. We can start a working group, call it NZ Doge and people will lap that up. We can talk about future savings right through to the election. We just need to be careful it doesn’t make its recommendations too soon.’
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:22am
      - Mark Hanley
        
        Cmm. still waiting for s reference backing up your oft repeated claim people are leaving nz because of luxon.
        
        We have positive net migration which is an incredible feat in the middle of the deep and long recession required to flush the axis of evil mess.
        
        If you’re going to post an accusation over and over again, surely you want to show people your accusation has even the teeniest bit of merit?
        
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        March 31, 2025 11:19am
      - cmm
        
        Mark: I have never once said that people are leaving because of Luxon. Stop gaslighting.
        
        They are leaving. We all know that.
        They are leaving for better opportunities elsewhere. We all know that.
        
        Some might have hoped that Luxon was going to reverse the damage of the past. Many waited a bit, got frustated and left.
        
        Maybe Luxon does have a plan. I don’t know. But if he does he better articulate it well and sufficiently convincingly.
        
        “There’s this guy called Mark Handley who says you should trust Luxon” is really not enough.
        
        And you don’t have to convince me. You need to convince the 40,000 a year who are leaving.
        
        “We have positive net migration”. Again, that’s gaslighting. We’re losing engineers, nurses and doctors and are getting Uber drivers. It is really bullshit to look at that in any positive light.
        
        Please come clean: are you a paid shill or just a huge fan?
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:22pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        Cmm. Even your post below accuses Luxon of losing 120k citizens per year…
        
        Luxon knows he has 3 years”
        
        No he doesn’t.
        In 3 years he’s losing 120,000 of NZs most skilled people and replacing them with 160,000 Uber drivers”
        
        Nothing to do with 6 years of mismanagement of our country followed by a necessary long and deep rescession.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:42pm
  - pdm
    
    MH.
    
    How much is all this Supermarket interference costing?
    
    Reduce the Corporate Tax rate and make it worthwhile for a new Supermarket to trade profitably in New Zealand, if they want to come, makes more sense to me.
    
    Get rid of the Grocery Commissioner too – how many people are working in that office?
    Bearing in mind it did not exist a couple of years ago.
    
    Disclosure:
    Apart from mrspdm and I being customers, mainly New World, I/we have no connection with the Supermarket industry.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:16am
    - Mark Hanley
      
      PDM. So you just solved the enduring multi generational and multi billion dollar supermarket rip off without: analysis, knowledge, responsibility, consideration of a multibllion dollar organisation runni a dirty campaign against you, or any expectation from anyone that you are correct,
      
      Thank goodness we have a PM with an exemplary record of running large organisations in charge!
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:58am
      - pdm
        
        MH – I don’t think NZ Supermarkets are a rip off.
        
        Willing buyer/willing seller.
        
        We have 3 Supermarkets within 2ks of where we live. Two are actually inside a k and we use one as we would a dairy in the old days.
        
        For our main fortnightly shop we prefer to travel 30ks return (approx) to a better stocked, with better service New World which also has wider, less encumbered aisles.
        
        Our choice and we go there because we can!! No doubt due to age that option will be taken away from us – but not this year with luck and personal care.
        
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        March 31, 2025 11:56am
      - NK
        
        So you just solved the enduring multi generational and multi billion dollar supermarket rip off without: analysis, knowledge, responsibility, consideration of a multibllion dollar organisation runni a dirty campaign against you, or any expectation from anyone that you are correct
        
        Mark, if you’re going to post accusations/ allegations like this, surely you want to show people your accusation/allegation has even the teeniest bit of merit?
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:15pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        “Thinks don’t run governments successfully” FACTS DO.
        
        Thank goodness we have a PM with an exemplary record of running large organisations in charge!
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:18pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        NK. I always encourage people to read my posts before they criticize.
        
        I didn’t say the supermarkets are running a campaign, I said it is one of the many factors Luxon has to consider.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:22pm
      - cmm
        
        “Thank goodness we have a PM with an exemplary record of running large organisations in charge”
        
        The same Air NZ that fucks over all the customers it can!
        
        How is it that a flight from Christchurch to Napier costs more than double a flight from Christchurch to Perth?
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:27pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        Now now cmm. There is no need for that language in a rational fact based debate.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:44pm
    - GazzaW
      
      I’m a tad mystified as to why our right-of-centre Government is prepared to provide incentives to attract a multinational competitor into our small market to compete with a co-operative of hundreds of Kiwi owner operators – namely Foodstuffs. Sure there are multi-millionaire owners of Pak & Save and New World supermarkets but the vast majority of them are mum & dad owners of local Four Square stores who have mortgaged on their homes to get into their businesses. As for the owners of Pak & Save and New World supermarkets, since when was being successful a crime in our country.
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:54pm
  - Steve Otto N Shore
    
    Luxon won’t entertain that. Imagine if he lost some votes after useless people were sacked.
    “What did you do last week?” ‘Not much but I tried hard”
    “Two things, thanks for coming in today and btw, you’re fired.”
    Not going to happen under Luxon. Be kind. Ardern with a blue tie.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:18am
    - Mark Hanley
      
      Luxon is both managing and leading the government expertly.
      
      Luxon knows he has 3 years to produce results so would be a fool to rush sticking plaster feel good measures Into the first year!
      
      Luxon has a measured plan and we are already benefitting from tamed inflation and returning economic growth!
      
      When infrastructure construction, new trade deals, and affordable grooceries kick in….. even the uninformed vocal pessimists will be better off.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:11am
      - cmm
        
        “Luxon knows he has 3 years”
        
        No he doesn’t.
        In 3 years he’s losing 120,000 of NZs most skilled people and replacing them with 160,000 Uber drivers.
        
        Leadership is not just having a plan. It is articulating that plan so that people have confidence and stay – preferably have more high value people move to NZ.
        
        We have only around 200,000 net tax payers in NZ. Every day we lose some to retirement and more overseas. Who is going to keep the socialist utopia going?
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:31pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        Cmm. Pls post a reference showing Luxon is losing 120k skilled workers and replacing them tj Uber drivers…..
        
        Surely you want to ensure your oft repeated claim isnt inaccurate?
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:35pm
      - Steve Otto N Shore
        
        The goose that lays the golden eggs is getting very constipated.
        cmm says 200,000 Net Taxpayers. That is not enough. The big crash is coming.
        
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        March 31, 2025 6:04pm
  - Quail
    
    MH,
    Yes , like the RMA ,no substantive changes until 2027 !
    Oops , is that post election??
    NZ needs change today!
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:36pm
    - Mark Hanley
      
      Quail. Don’t you read the news?…..
      
      -Inflation tamed,
      – roads getting fixed and built,
      – growth returning,
      – crime reducing,
      – cancer drugs funded,
      – tax reduction delivered,
      – a substantial trade agreement delivered and another one with the world’s most populous country on the way.
      – knowledge based curriculum and proven teaching methods rolled out to.our children
      – Kids attending school
      – gang patch ban implemented and working
      -other proven gang crime reduction measures rolled out and working
      – Cell phone ban school rolled out and working .
      – emergency housing disaster sorted.
      
      I could go on but ex ACT MPs get upset when I write about all the great things Luxon and his team have achieved…… and I’d hate to upset the consistently and unnecessarily negative people.
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:42pm
      - Quail
        
        MH ,
        Please answer the above question , and now another two :“When will the ferry contracts be let and for how much?”
        and “ when will the budget be balanced” ?
        There will be no relief from inflation until that happens.
        MH Take a look at KiwiSaver and please explain that!
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:12pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      That is rubbish, Bishop said first reading by mid this year, and he says the law will be passed early.next year 2026
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:27pm
  - Ra Henare
    
    We already apparently have the equivalent of DOGE which started work on 1st March with David Semour as boss.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minister_for_Regulation
    
    Yep, Mr Semour is a politician and good at talking. Not a Musk, good at doing.
    
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    March 31, 2025 6:47pm
Grunter

Many KBers have critisised my comments regards the proxy war against Russia. For the past 3 years, I have said that this war is nuts. One that can not be won by NATO. A war that COULD blow up into nuclear exchanges.

Recently, this view has been vindicated by the 2025 Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community.

https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/ATA-2025-Unclassified-Report.pdf

“Russia in the past year has seized the upper hand in its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and is on a path to accrue greater leverage to press Kyiv and its Western backers to negotiate an end to the war that grants Moscow concessions it seeks. Continuing the Russia-Ukraine war perpetuates strategic risks to the United States of
unintended escalation to large-scale war, the potential use of nuclear weapons, heightened insecurity among NATO Allies, particularly in Central, Eastern, and Northern Europe, and a more emboldened China and North Korea. Even though Russian President Putin will be unable to achieve the total victory he envisioned when
initiating the large-scale invasion in February 2022, Russia retains momentum as a grinding war of attrition plays to Russia’s military advantages. This grinding war of attrition will lead to a gradual but steady erosion of Kyiv’s position on the battlefield, regardless of any U.S. or allied attempts to impose new and greater costs on Moscow.”
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March 31, 2025 8:12am
- Dudley Quaffquaff
  
  I’m no military strategist, so for all I know this assessment could be right.
  
  What I don’t get, is why you seem to think this is a good thing that everybody should just have gone along with from the start.
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:53am
  - RoboRob
    
    No one is saying its a ‘good thing’. We are just being realistic. If we had accepted a peace deal earlier, the terms would have been better for Ukraine. By leaving it this long, Russia has the better bargaining hand and Ukraine has a lot less people.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:25am
    - Dudley Quaffquaff
      
      Who exactly is “we” here? The people of Ukraine, and the people of the countries nearest to the action, don’t seem to think that accepting a “peace deal”, by which Russia and now the US mean nothing less than Ukraine’s complete surrender, would have been better for them.
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:53am
      - RoboRob
        
        What do you propose as an alternative?
        
        Everyone opposed to the ‘peace’ treaty / surrender never answers that question. Look at all the downticks for anyone that proposes an end of the war. None of these people are proposing an alternative apart from ‘fight until Ukraine wins’, which clearly doesn’t appear to be working.
        
        You can argue, and I agree, that Russia are the bad guys here and deserve to lose. They are dishonest and may break any agreement as they have done in the past. They may simply pause and then attack another country in the future. The Ukrainians are victims and the west has not provided the support they should have. All of this is true. But I ask again, what is the proposed solution? US boots on the ground?
        
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        March 31, 2025 4:08pm
    - Grunter
      
      Exactly.
      Some commentators keep saying that it is the morally right thing to do to fight Russia. I say it’s the morally right thing to do to look at reality and agree on the best peace deal you can as early as you can ……vs sending millions on innocents to their early deaths in an unwinnable war. That is immoral.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:13pm
    - Bevan
      
      If the world was “realistic” in 1939, the Third Reich would still be going strong.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:29pm
      - RoboRob
        
        Again, what is the plan to beat Russia? US boots on the ground?
        
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        March 31, 2025 3:04pm
      - Grunter
        
        Bevan – you keep repeating bumper sticker slogans. WHAT IS YOUR PLAN?? Until you come up with one I’ll assume you don’t have one. So just keep up the killing eh?
        
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        March 31, 2025 3:57pm
    - Dudley Quaffquaff
      
      And they’ve had a lot of experience with Russian peace deals, agreements, promises, treaties etc.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:47pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      It goes back before the invasion.
      
      If Biden had engaged with Putin & proposed resolutions of the tensions & conflicts
      Instead of propagating the Ukraine NATO membership myth.
      
      Then the invasion wouldn’t have happened, and this whole sorry mess would have been averted.
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:51pm
- RoboRob
  
  Have always agreed with you on this. Sadly Ukraine would have been in a much better bargaining position 18mths ago.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:10am
  - imalwaysright
    
    At least they are getting a nice $US1.5 billion ski resort.
    
    https://snowbrains.com/construction-of-luxury-ski-resort-in-the-ukraine-starts-in-the-middle-of-russian-invasion/
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:18am
- NothingLeft
  
  Russia’s offensives have run out of steam. The territorial gains they are making are miniscule – a few km² a day, and come at withering cost to their military – typically 1-2000 troop losses, or 5-10x what Ukraine is losing, slow fighting retreats are optimal for attriting opposition as offense traditionally sees 3-5x losses of defense. Russia are in recent weeks actually losing territory in Toretsk and Potrovsk as they’ve lost logistical ability to support their front line troops due to ukrainian drone dominance. Comical to see what Russia are now fielding – genuine museum pieces as front line weapons, with logistics via donkeys, e-scooters, and chopping up old ladas
  
  And Ukraine is now building 13000 FPV drones a day, many times the far lower quality russian drone fleet, with greater range and better trained pilots – achieving absolute aerial dominance over front line and while putting few of their troops in harms way. They have also developed interceptor drones to take out Russian long range Shaheed drones (a growing problem since US shut off support and Russia shifted to concentrated 100+ drone attacks on different cities every night)
  
  Ukraine has also announced a major ramp up in larger long range drone production that will come through in a few months, bringing number up to 100’s a day – which is what will screw undefendable vastness of Russia and end war. Europe are showing a lot harder attitude and ramping up meaningful support to ukraine.
  
  Politically Trump called a journalist yesterday and said he is pissed off at Putin’s ceasefire intransigence, so perhaps US support spiggot will be turned on again.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:39am
  - Grunter
    
    NothingLeft
    Where do you get your info from? Mine was the combined US Intelligence Community in an official capacity. Your’s sounds like ISW or maybe even the BBC?
    
    BTW – Trumps “pissed off” comment was regards Russia saying Zelensky needs to be replaced and elections held. Which is kinda ironic 3 weeks after Trump called Zelensky “an unelected Dictator”. So nothing to do with the cease fire being ignored (both sides have ignored it from the supposed Day 1)
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:44pm
  - Ross Bayer
    
    Nothing,
    You might want to read this from NYT
    Zero Hedge NYT Secret History of war in Ukraine
    If you want a summary PUTIN WAS RIGHT ALL ALONG
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:50pm
  - herb1
    
    Drones are are making 71-75% of the kills according to Ukraine Ministry of War so Ukraines manufacturing is very important. No point of Russians having massive numbers of artillery systems if they lose 50- 100a day and struggle to. Get ammunition to them.Donkeys can only carry so much . Now we’re seeing Russian soldiers on e scooters. Russia isn’t winning
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:52pm
    - Ra Henare
      
      Interesting, you believe the Ukraine Ministry of War ?
      
      You do understand that propaganda is the weapon of war used by all sides in any conflict.
      
      Nothingleft employes that strategy on KB. (as propagandist for the west)
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:54pm
  - kowtow
    
    ‘Europe are showing a lot harder attitude and ramping up meaningful support to ukraine.’
    
    Genuine question.
    
    What meaningful support?
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:31pm
    - Dudley Quaffquaff
      
      Here’s what Reuters has to say on that.
      
      Europe has been the biggest provider of aid to Ukraine, allocating 132 billion euros (138.75 billion) of financial, military and humanitarian assistance since January 2022, just before Russia’s invasion, while the United States has provided 114 billion euros in total, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.
      
      And much of the US assistance has been in the form of obsolete weaponry that they’d otherwise have had to pay to decommission, so the cost to them has not been that great even though its value to Ukraine has been, something President Zelensky has repeatedly acknowledged.
      
      So it’s not the case that the US has been doing all the work while everybody else sits idly by. Several countries are actually doing more, in terms of % of GDP, than the US is (Kiel Institute again). The US is, however, the only one of Ukraine’s allies that has been expecting payment and is the only one that’s now actively making the situation worse for Ukraine.
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:46pm
- Cassandra
  
  If Europe and America set their minds to resisting this Russian aggression then it’d stop. Unchecked Russia will not stop at Ukraine.
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:02am
  - RoboRob
    
    How would they do that now, US boots on the ground?
    
    Have a look at Europe, its all words and platitudes. They are out there saying ‘Fight and we will support you’. Behind the scenes they cant even come to an agreement on who will provide the money or how much. They are hopelessly reliant on the US for leadership.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:27am
    - cmm
      
      It would seem they are happy to fight some sort of proxy war with Russia via Ukraine – using the Ukrainians as cannon fodder.
      
      It is one thing sending Ukraine a few batches of howitzer shells and obsolete tanks, but I suspect that few European countries would send their your blood to be spilled.
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:59am
      - Bevan
        
        I mean, how dare Ukraine defend itself right?
        
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        March 31, 2025 1:31pm
    - Gussy Fink-Nottle
      
      “Behind the scenes they cant even come to an agreement on who will provide the money or how much”
      
      The Yanks don’t get it – they think Europe is one, homogeneous federation, capable of dealing with existential issues that require swift and decisive action.
      
      Rather it’s dozens of different hands, all grabbing at the tiller, arguing which rocks to dash themselves on.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:24am
  - cmm
    
    “Unchecked Russia will not stop at Ukraine”
    What makes you think that?
    
    All I see is Russia trying to secure the Russian speaking areas of Ukraine. They are not seeming to want to take the whole of Ukraine. If they don’t even want to take the whole of Ukraine then why would they want to invade other countries?
    
    People seem to forget that Ukraine has had civil war for well over a decade – long before the Russians entered.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:57am
    - NothingLeft
      
      Russia hasn’t changed it’s rhetoric with regard to Ukraine one iota, and that is the line run on their state propaganda TV every day. They still want to take the whole country.
      
      The Russian speaking areas of ukraine, occupied and unoccupied loathe Putin as his war has seen horrendous losses for them both in lives and destroyed infrastructure and buildings – as well as ongoing depredations of out-of-control Russian soldiers on civilian populations. See for example all the mass graves of tortured, raped and murdered civilians and kidnapped children from ‘russian speaking areas’ Ukraine liberated in ’23, look up Bucha massacres if you want an easy example.
      
      The ‘civil war’ was fomented and funded by Putin after his puppet lost election in 2014, Russia supplying arms, money and fighters – for example the Missile system that shot down the Dutch airliner on Ukraine territory. It was simply Putin warming up to invasion.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:09am
      - Ra Henare
        
        I have got to admire your propaganda nothingleft.
        Consistent if nothing else.
        
        Would be great if you could give to links/evidence fro some of your claims.
        
        Presume you speak Russian to make the claim
        
        Russia hasn’t changed it’s rhetoric with regard to Ukraine one iota, and that is the line run on their state propaganda TV every day.
        
        Or are you quoting somebody else?
        
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        March 31, 2025 6:59pm
    - imalwaysright
      
      Russia don’t want Ukraine.
      They want Ukraine as a buffer without foreign troops.
      It also works the other way, Europe also gets a buffer without Russian troops.
      Good fences make good neighbours.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:22am
      - NothingLeft
        
        Europe has never been a hegemonic military threat to Russia – it is simply not something they have any interest or need in risking.
        
        Since the Soviet crumbling the goal of Russia has always been to re-establish the eastern European Russian empire – but the crappy Russian Mafiosi economy kills innovation and enterprise, robbing anyone who creates anything valuable, and causes terminal brain drain, so it has seen eastern Europe drift ever westward to the better lifestyles and opportunities offered. Europe would always win the peace, so Russia started a war.
        
        The end result of Putin’s invasion has been huge expansion of Nato – with Finland and Sweden Joining, increasing the border with Nato greatly and massively increasing Nato military spending. This was always the obvious outcome, and Putin would have know this, but his agenda is to stop Russia’s fringes drifting away towards Europe as is clearly better for their populations. It’s not about military threat, it about the worse lifestyles in Russia – Putin just can’t compete with better government and free market offered in west, so his only move is violently repressive govt.
        
        Fundamentally he is an evil Mfker, who cares more about his historical legacy than about the happiness of the population he rules – or those he is trying to subjugate.
        
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        March 31, 2025 12:49pm
      - Bevan
        
        They have no buffer as Russia boarders Latvia and Estonia, and since Finland joined NATO their border with NATO has expanded massively.
        
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        March 31, 2025 1:33pm
      - Ra Henare
        
        For those rattling on about Buffers and borders. Look at a ferkin Map!!!!!
        
        Finland borders a desolate area of Russia, far from Moscow. Albeit close to St Petersburg.
        
        Latvia Estonia, are also relatively far away.
        
        Which countries are close to Moscow and their populated area.?
        Belarus, Ukraine
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:06pm
    - Lance
      
      “All I see is Russia trying to secure the Russian speaking areas of Ukraine. They are not seeming to want to take the whole of Ukraine”
      
      I call total bullshit on that. I agree Putin thought it would be a walkover, but reality has set in, and the world can now see that the Russian army is a shadow of what they thought it was capable of.
      But the spectre of Russia resting, recovering and rearming to try again is very real. Certainly that’s what Poland and other European countries think.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:22am
      - Ra Henare
        
        So lets play so whats for a minute.
        Russia takes over all of Ukraine.
        Garrison force to handle the occupation?
        600,000 to 1 million troops with all sorts of support forces and resource requirements.
        
        Now to invade a hostile part of Europe.?
        Poland is oft quoted.
        You do know that Poles hate the Russians.
        
        In 2023, Poland spent the greatest share of its GDP for military expenditures (3.9%) among all NATO members.[6] With over 216,100 active personnel in 2024, the Polish Armed Forces are the third largest military in NATO, after Turkey and the USA.[7]
        
        So to invade Poland. How big a military force(with associated supplies and weaponry) will Russia have to penetrate more than 10 miles in to Polish Territory, let alone take over the country.
        
        Russia is struggling to fully invading Ukraine!!!
        Where and how will they get an extra Million strong combatant force with all the extra required military/weapons support?
        
        Are you starting to see how stupid the Putin invading Europe meme propaganda is?
        
        For reference, look at the US Invasion of Iraq, American involvement in the Vietnam War. Abject failures that cost millions of lives and trillions of dollars to achieve…NOTHING.
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:17pm
    - Allan
      
      Do you really believe that?
      
      If you do you really haven’t been paying attention.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:25am
    - James Stephenson
      
      They are not seeming to want to take the whole of Ukraine.
      
      Say what?? The “Special Military Operation” was intended to drive straight to Kyiv and install a pro-Russian puppet administration. The fact that this failed, because Ukraine’s military was designed with the single purpose of defending against such an eventuality, doesn’t mean that wasn’t Putin’s original goal.
      
      If they don’t even want to take the whole of Ukraine then why would they want to invade other countries?
      
      Because Putin’s dream is to rebuild the USSR? Should we ask how the Baltic countries feel about it?
      
      People seem to forget that Ukraine has had civil war for well over a decade – long before the Russians entered.
      
      Which Putin had absolutely no involvement in fomenting…honest. Now, about that bridge.
      
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      March 31, 2025 12:19pm
    - Greenheart
      
      Think before writing. The war started with a Russian invasion from Belarus towards Kiev. You have no proof that Putin will stop trying to subjugate the whole of Ukraine
      
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      March 31, 2025 7:01pm
- Grunter
  
  That might be the first time one of my war comments has received more upticks than downticks. And no serious evidence against my argument – lots of the usual bluster, but no serious evidence that reflects the reality.
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:49pm
  - Allan
    
    That’s because all your points have been refuted many times already.
    
    But still you persist. Good for you.
    
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    March 31, 2025 6:00pm
- NothingLeft
  
  Drones have changed war, forever and ye olde western military are struggling to build that into their understanding.
  
  Russia has exhausting it’s means to make significant offensive gains, they can only build about 10% of what they are losing artillery and armor wise. See eg covert cabals analysis of depleted soviet weapons stocks:
  https://youtu.be/K8CcuVCDEUw
  
  Drones dominate the front lines now, with Ukraine producing 14k a day they are responsible for 70-80% of kills, meaning low-quality Russian artillery is nearing irrelevancy – though there glide bombs are still a problem. There is simply no way to make significant offensive gains against pervasive drones without taking enormous infantry losses as Russia is doing – at a cost of about 3 casualties per hectare taken over last month. Russia simply can’t win given those numbers and that reality.
  
  And drone operators hunkered down in bunkers 5-10km from front are are minimally vulnerable on defense. The old 3:1 ratios of loss for offense vs defense have been massively skewed by this new tech.
  
  So the front lines are to all intents and purposes now fixed – excepting in areas where drones can deplete logistic support for the front line at minimal cost as Ukraine is doing in a few spots.
  
  The real war in now with longer range heavy drones taking out essential infrastructure. Russia launches about 150 a night, with about 10-20% getting through. Ukraine is probably around 50 a night (will ramp to 100’s this year), with an unknown number getting through, but a lot of big scalps over last months – like Billion dollar damage inflicted on Engels bomber base a few nights ago, and tens of refineries struck. They are already have a major impact on Russian oil production, and as numbers increase that will reach a point where Russia simply can’t continue (their economy is already being wrecked).
  And the scary thing for Russia is that it is very cheap for Ukraine to expand long range drone production, especially with European support. $10million a day on such drones would win the war before years end.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:44pm
Bridgenag

Why Is What We Feed Infants So Unhealthy?
The Hidden Dangers of Infant Formula and The Incredible Benefits of Natural Milk

https://open.substack.com/pub/amidwesterndoctor/p/why-is-what-we-feed-infants-so-unhealthy?r=1aj1bv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
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March 31, 2025 8:19am
cmm

Yesterday DPF posted an article on average earnings for various degrees.

Three things that spring out to me:
1) It does not take into account experience. Few engineers go on to get Masters and PhDs. Once you have a BSc or BEng experience counts far more than extra qualifications. That seems to also hold for medicine and Law: once you get the required miniumm qualifications then other things matter.
2) Values of PhDs are extremely variable. If you don’t get a PhD in chemistry or such then all you will do is wash test tubes. You absolutely need a PhD to build a career. Same too for other “soft sciences” (biology etc) as well as arts (history etc). Heck even most librarians have a Masters.
3) They’re pitiful salaries on an international scale. No wonder we’re losing people overseas.
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March 31, 2025 8:19am
- Simon
  
  “3) They’re pitiful salaries on an international scale. No wonder we’re losing people overseas.”
  
  Depends on what the cost of living is. Can get by on lower salary if the costs are much lower.
  
  However in NZ there is also huge tax burden on those making $100K pa plus who work outside of govt. These people carry NZ’s tax burden.
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:41am
  - RoboRob
    
    Agree, hate talk of ‘high wage economies’ being great. I would be very happy on a $100 a week if rent was $20 and fish and chips was 20c each.
    
    In 2000 the US avg wage was $32,154.82. In NZ it was $39,764. We had the higher wage but did it mean we were better off? Absolutely not. The USD was worth more and the prices of good in the US were significantly cheaper.
    
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    March 31, 2025 9:18am
    - cmm
      
      Unfortunately one of the few “higher wage economies” that the government can manipulate is the public sector.
      
      We have far too many over-paid public service workers. That is one place where a Masters or PhD likely pays – without providing much extra value.
      
      All money effectively links back to its buying power. If you could get rent for $20 and fish and chips for 20cents then that $100 would be a good wage.
      
      Unfortunately that’s not how things are. Outside a few consumer goods such as cars and electronics, most things cost more in real terms than they did 30 years ago.
      
      When I first moved to Christchurch in 1995, I could have bought a reasonable house in Christchurch for 3x my salary. Now a person at the same stage of their career would be paying 5x their salary. The first mortgage we took was on a lifestyle block with house for $190k (2.5x salary). 20 year mortgage was $1200 per month but we were paying it off much faster than that.
      That same place would be $600k or more now. Unlikely I would be earning more than $130k though (ie. 4.5x salary).
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:23pm
      - Quail
        
        CMM
        This is the reality of inflation.It is about redistribution of the savings and assets that the elderly have worked all their life for.
        The stark truth of this comment can be shown by todays Kiwi saver. Any apparent gains , and there is not many of them ,has to measured against the lost purchasing power of the savings. A loss of 25% plus in the last few years
        The great economist Milton Friedman postulated “that inflation is a tax.”
        Clearly it is a tax — a very very unjust tax imposed by successive Governments.
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:40pm
  - kowtow
    
    Yep , huge taxes that then go bigly to all manner of ngo’s , race reconciliation guilt payments ,whole govt depts , DEI hires across the whole of central and local govt ;which then create their own industries which require even more feeding on our taxes .
    
    There is a real need for root and branch culling, and honesty about how undermining and destructive the whole thing is.
    
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    March 31, 2025 9:44am
  - cmm
    
    Well, yes, it does depend on the cost of living which is extremely high in NZ.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:14am
- peterwn
  
  Re 1). Professions (and trades) nowadays require practitioners to show they are undertaking a programme of continuing professional development and that they show they continue to remain competent in their fields. This process could be regarded as a postgraduate qualification. In the case of medical specialists (and even General Practice is regarded as a specialty), the training and examinations (including orals) could be regarded as equivalent to a Masters, indeed almost to PhD standard. And this is no pushover, re-sits are very common and even then some do not make the grade. This would be far more relevant than a Masters degree studied straight after an undergraduate degree.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:05am
  - cmm
    
    Yup, certainly. The same applies in many fields. These forms of training and development are far more useful that Masters and PhDs.
    
    When I left university in the early 1980s there were still punch cards and COBOL. I now work on designing computer chips and satellite communications (mainly) – things that didn’t exist back in the day.
    
    In any technical field you need to spend at least 10 hours a week catching up.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:48am
    - Keith White
      
      Back in the day (yawn, I know, sorry) to find out what was happening at the cutting edge of both my generalized casualty practice and in particularly related specialties such as orthopaedics / intensive care / neurology – keeping up-to-date meant going on ye feet to the hospital library, physically finding the copies of relevant journals that had arrived by sea months later from usually the UK (and occasionally the US and hardly ever Australia) – and looking at the contents pages with the MkI eyeball to see what might be relevant as well as new, and what shibboleths might have been laid to rest.
      
      These days, I can access at least an order of magnitude more relevant journal articles in 1/10th of the time – but there are times when the sheer volume that’s available overwhelms my capability to read and process. So a couple of years back I started rationing the references that I would, well, refer to.
      
      I’m not sure I am overall better informed that I was when I was a freshly-hatched house officer; I certainly believe I am overall more often misinformed, unless I’m extremely careful. And even then…
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:02pm
Pope Punctilious II

Oh no! “Ideology is pushing Maori knowledge out of the curriculum” screams the headline at E-tangata.

A typo, surely. How about “Government pushes back (a little bit) against ideological capture of the curriculum”.

There, fixed it for you.
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March 31, 2025 8:29am
- G152
  
  Sadly we appear to be placing one race above all others.
  
  36 1
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  March 31, 2025 8:46am
  - Steve Otto N Shore
    
    160 cultures in NZ.
    
    22 2
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    March 31, 2025 8:49am
    - Mark Hanley
      
      Brilliant!
      
      Eric Stanford is an absolute star.
      
      Perhaps a future PM contender.
      
      10 5
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      March 31, 2025 9:12am
      - Groggy
        
        which is why Chris Luxon is happy to let David Seymour gaslight her mercilessly. She is the best performing Minister by a country mile.
        
        6 0
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        March 31, 2025 1:04pm
      - Conservatarian
        
        Jeepers MH, are you trying to roll Luxon?
        
        6 1
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        March 31, 2025 1:37pm
      - Pope Punctilious II
        
        We can call her a “star” when she’s turned education around, and when the claims made in the E-tangata’s article actually come true.
        
        What has Stanford actually accomplished so far? As for PM material – why would you want another progressive at the helm?
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:59pm
    - imalwaysright
      
      …and 99.375 % of them don’t try to shove theirs down everyone elses throats.
      
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      March 31, 2025 9:26am
- Swifty
  
  What a wonderful advertisement for Rata, Stanford et al and their values and what they’re trying to achieve.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:58am
- Yvette
  
  Aryan like –
  The term “Aryan” originally referred to the Indo-Iranians, specifically the Iranians and Indo-Aryans, as a self-designation, meaning “noble” or “of noble birth”. It later became a pseudoscientific concept used to describe a racial grouping, which was later misused and twisted by Nazi ideology.
  – so either meaning
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:17am
  - Colinxy
    
    Theosophy in particular for the latter. Theosophy’s founder Helena Blavatsky came up with the “root stocks” of which Aryan was one.
    
    Houston Chamberlain (no relation to Neville) advanced Blavatsky’s ideology. These became popular with the National Socialists who advanced Chamberlain’s ideology further – even before Hitler came onto the scene, for example, the self described “Karl Marx of National Socialism”, Rudolf Jung.
    
    Theosophy has been remarkably influential even discounting the National Socialists – especially through Alice Bailey.
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:55pm
pdm

Hope you are okay David Garrett.

It must have been a decent shake.
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March 31, 2025 8:30am
- David Garrett
  
  pdm: Thanks for your concern mate. Yes, “all good” here, and Yes, it was a very decent shake. Some of my neighbours fled, but on an island where the highest point is 130 feet above sea level where do you go? And on that higher point, near the palace, there is probably standing room for 50 people max.
  
  I am some way from the sea, so I just stayed put – as did my palangi neighbours. My Indian neighbours fled to God knows where – they would have got stuck in a traffic jam two or three k’s from home. Waste of time.
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:42am
artemisia

Rocket Lab has won a slice of a Pentagon contract.

How’s the proposed rocket launch pad at Kaitorete Spit going? Kaitorete could generate $300 million a year according to 2021 forecasts. It’s a joint venture between the government and two local Maori groups.

Sounds like the government has backed off funding for vertical launch rockets. Not to worry, there’s a new business case coming, though I guess that $300 mill a year forecast won’t be front and centre.
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March 31, 2025 8:37am
- Mark Hanley
  
  All power to Peter Beck. An incredible Kiwi doing incredible things but….
  
  Why should taxpayers fund a billionaires business venture?
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:50am
  - artemisia
    
    AFAIK Rocket Lab is not involved in the Kaitorete Spit project. Though if Mr Beck had been it would have been up and running well before now.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:56am
    - marcw
      
      Beck is an astute businessman, saw the writing on the wall and immediately cut his losses and the potential development when the local mafia started with “won’t somebody think of the lizards”. Widely reported at the time.
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:51am
    - cmm
      
      What could possibly be in it for Rocket Lab?
      
      They already have 2 launch sites. Why the need for another?
      
      Depending on what you’re launching, it is generally better to be closer to the equator. I would think that if RL were to want a third site they’d go for somewhere else. Maybe Northern Australia. Maybe Texas.
      
      Another site in NZ makes little sense.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:42pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    There is major benefit in having high technology businesses in NZ from network effects of drawing in talent, creating a logistical support base for such businesses and providing a fertile ground for major new export earning companies to spring forth. That was for example one of the big unrecognized costs of shuttering oil and gas – loss of significant heavy engineering competence and businesses in NZ that could no longer support other industries and businesses. NZ breeds the usual percentage of high-talent engineers, and it is better if we can retain them to increase NZ’s productivity and earnings.
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:32am
    - cmm
      
      “There is major benefit in having high technology businesses in NZ from network effects of drawing in talent, creating a logistical support base for such businesses and providing a fertile ground for major new export earning companies to spring forth.”
      
      Being in those industries, that is not how it works.
      
      Most successful high tech businesses in NZ get bought out by foreign conglomerates and effectively become lower cost workforces for, most typically, some American company.
      
      There is very little local network effect. I write hundreds of emails etc per month. Less than 1 per month is to any NZ company.
      
      You really only get export earnings if you manufacture in NZ and sell overseas. Almost none of the NZ high tech companies do that. Instead, they export IP to America or whatever at rockbottom prices and the Americans (or whatever) then sell the goods and get the leverage off that.
      
      High tech people almost entirely work in bubbles disconnected from the local economy. All we do is bring in some revenue to be taxed and GST when we buy groceries etc. We don’t really lift the economy through creating factories and causing such “trickle down” economics.
      
      Sure, there are a few that do create local manufacturing, but they are a very small % of our high tech workers.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:52pm
  - NK
    
    Why should taxpayers fund a billionaires business venture?
    
    Beck is not a billionaire.
    
    Why should taxpayers fund ANY business venture?
    
    Why did Bill English bail out South Canterbury Finance to the tune of $2 billion dollars?
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:10pm
    - Mark Hanley
      
      NK. In addition to reading my posts before you attempt to criticize, you should also do a little research before posting.
      
      That’s 0 from 2 today……
      
      https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/peter-beck-a-billionaire-as-rocket-lab-shares-surge-25-on-strong-guidance-first-neutron-contract/3MCWJSCJBZAB5PA3P7JCNN7WTA/
      
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      March 31, 2025 2:31pm
      - NK
        
        It’s not 0 from 2 – where’s your evidence that supermarkets are conducting a “multi billion dollar supermarket rip off”?
        
        1 0
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        March 31, 2025 5:18pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        YOU’RE RIGHT NK.
        NOT 0 FROM 2
        0 from 3!
        
        A Commerce Commission report in 2022 concluded that supermarket competition wasn’t working well for New Zealand’s shoppers.
        
        It found supermarkets were earning $1 million a day in excess profits.
        
        0 0
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        March 31, 2025 5:32pm
      - Prince
        
        ‘Excess Profits’. Given the Commerce Commission is largely made up of Green Party advocates, how do they define ‘excess profits’ ?
        
        0 0
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        March 31, 2025 9:49pm
    - Mark Hanley
      
      Bill English bailed out the idiots who put their money into finance companies because to not do so would have:
      1. crashed the nz economy like nothing we’ve seen before
      2. Left a large number of retired people without savings which woild make them wards of the state anyway.
      
      It’s boring batting away ill considered exclusively negative comments….
      
      Is there anyone out there with fact based dispassionate views?
      
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      March 31, 2025 2:40pm
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      English was tied to a law that Cullen put in place, any finance company with more than $1 billion must be baled out
      
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      March 31, 2025 6:36pm
      - Mark Hanley
        
        Nice one G. I was losing hope!
        
        0 0
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        March 31, 2025 9:00pm
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    we already did, and then Mr Beck sold out to US investors.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:54pm
- Raphael
  
  The Pentagon launches won’t be happening from NZ because:
  1.) US National Security reasons.
  2.) As I understand it the new RocketLabs Neutron rocket requires significantly more LOX than the NZ infrastructure can provide (our entire production capacity will half fill the rocket)
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:27pm
- the deity formerly known as nigel6888
  
  It seems that Rocket Lab has got in Collins’ ear and is preventing Tawhaki from getting any support.
  
  Sad, its a brilliant facility in the right location – this is the high tech future that NZ should be running towards, yet here we sit, dawdling away, importing uber drivers and RSV workers and wondering why we aren’t rich yet.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:54pm
I remember when

Why did the Crusaders not use Plan B?
I’m not even sure that they had a Plan A.
However, the real fact to confirmed by the game was that Moana Pasifika is possibly the best attacking team in the competition.
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March 31, 2025 8:53am
Steve Otto N Shore

Gone fission.
I don’t think NZ will ever get their heads out of the sand. We have to do something yet electricity generation is being ignored. Why? Fear porn and gaslighting is why. Nuclear waste is not yellow 200L drums of green goo, that is a leftie lie.

https://join1440.com/topics/nuclear-power/r/an-overview-of-us-nuclear-plants?

Lots going on in the links, interesting.
“Nuclear power is one hell of a way to boil water.- Anonymous, sometimes misattributed to Albert Einstein.”
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March 31, 2025 9:01am
- Mark Hanley
  
  Fukushima?
  
  1 8
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  March 31, 2025 9:13am
  - imalwaysright
    
    Solar panel industry is far more deadly than nuclear plants.
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:39am
  - rouppe
    
    Fukushima what?
    
    That plant ran into trouble because the cooling system failed. The reactor did not explode, melt, radiate or anything else.
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:15pm
- alloytoo
  
  Whomever said it, it remains true, which explains why Nuclear remains the most feasible alternative to Coal or Gas plants for base load. it’s plug and play into a grid as apposed to the unreliables.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:32am
- sirknz
  
  I keep getting Aussie fear porn over their plans for a nuclear power plant, usually from a guy who is ‘independant’ with very well lit videos with fairly high production values, or from the Aus Labor Party.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:35am
- Ian Boag
  
  Nuclear waste is not yellow 200L drums of green goo
  
  True. Fuel rods have a working life a bit under 10 years at which point they are removed from the reactor and replaced. A significant part of the problem is that the stuff needs to be segregated for hundreds of years before it decays to a safe level.
  
  At present, most of it is sitting in water-cooled pools by the power stations. All good so long as the plumbing keeps working for a few hundred years. Dry casks are an improvement but still not a maintenance-free solution.
  
  You can reprocess the stuff to extract plutonium to use as further fuel, but that is also pretty ugly. Look up Sellafield to see how ugly that can get.
  
  There is not a lot of it this nuclear waste, but it is truly yukky stuff.
  
  The other problem with NZ going nuke is the commercial structure of our generation system. None of Meridian, Genesis or Contact are big enough to add a single nuke (even an SMR whenever that happens) to their current plant inventory, so I’m not quite sure how that would be managed.
  
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  March 31, 2025 9:59am
  - wsk12345
    
    It would hve to be no bigger than the single largest element on the system now which is probably one of the CCGT stations or the HVDC link. 400 MW? Any bigger and they will be allocated a lot more reserve costs.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:10am
  - Steve Otto N Shore
    
    Not big enough is a poor excuse Ian. I would never expect Meridian, Genesis or Contact to do anything. It has to be Rolls Royce, Westinghouse or similar, someone who knows what they are doing and not influenced by crazy socialists!
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:13am
    - Ian Boag
      
      Rolls Royce, Westinghouse or similar
      
      Of course. Socialism has nothing to with it. Someone like RR/W etc would build the station(s) for a Meridian/Genesis or Contact to own and operate.
      
      Or would you have the gummint get back into a centralised system like the old NZED or Electricorp? Or would that be a bit too socialist for you?
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:20am
    - Burtland
      
      if one of the iwi sponsored nuclear, none of the leftards would oppose it
      
      like naming the tunnel boring machine Dame Whina Coopera – how much did that cost
      
      4 2
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      March 31, 2025 12:55pm
      - Ian Boag
        
        Last time I looked there were no iwi-run power companies.
        
        0 0
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        March 31, 2025 6:11pm
  - imalwaysright
    
    The problem isn’t generation, whatever the type.
    Our problem is that we sit around for forty or fifty years and talk the problem to death.
    Then we look up and wonder why the rest of the world have moved forward and we are still here talking the same old crap.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:16am
    - Ian Boag
      
      True. So the first step would be to have one or more gentailer decide to get in early for an SMR. Front of the queue and all that – we could be early adopters.
      
      There might be a few (!) RMA-type objections about whose backyard the station(s) are built in, and no insurer would touch it with a barge pole.
      
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      March 31, 2025 10:33am
  - cmm
    
    Nuclear waste is not all the same.
    
    In these discussions, most people consider only high level waste (spent fuel rods etc), but far more problematic is the amount, and handling of, lower levels of waste.
    
    Every bit of clothing etc ends up becoming low or medium level waste. This adds up to quite a large volume.
    
    Later on when a plant is decommissioned, the whole bloody plant becomes waste.
    
    A coal station is easy to decomission. Just stop feeding in coal and water. The fire goes out. It cools down and you can call in all the scrap metal people.
    
    Not so nukes. The Windscale fire happened in 1957 and the deconstruction has not completed yet. All up, it is likely to take over a century.
    Three Mile Island – 2 had its accident in 1979. The clean up/decommissioning continues today.
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:36am
    - Ian Boag
      
      Later on when a plant is decommissioned, the whole bloody plant becomes waste.
      
      The Brits are decommissioning their Magnox reactors. Basically the plan is – shut it down – defuel it and put the rods in a pool. Lock the place up and leave it unmanned for 100-odd years (honestly). It’s made a bit harder by the reactors being kind of bespoke and not all the construction drawings are available in some cases.
      
      Happy days …
      
      You might enjoy “Fallout” by Fred Pearce. A walk through the nuclear age. Not a rant and quite matter of fact.
      
      2 3
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      March 31, 2025 12:10pm
      - cmm
        
        Yup, quite. Just kicking the can down the road is no plan at all.
        
        Nukes are fine so long as we can figure out ways to handle the waste properly. And by that I mean ALL the waste.
        
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        March 31, 2025 1:37pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    Fast breeder reactors like molten salt (chloride of fluoride) or Gate’s ‘natrium’ (sodium cooled) fix this. Reduces fuel use and long term waste by an order of magnitude. They’ve been demonstrated many times over last 50 years, just need commercialization (which was halted due to Feelz-driven western enviroMENTALISTS for several decades). Expect good commercial breeder designs to be available within a decade – eg https://www.copenhagenatomics.com/
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:38am
    - Ian Boag
      
      The FBR is a bit like fusion, Has been a few years away for the last 40 or 50. Alas …..
      
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      March 31, 2025 2:39pm
Steve Otto N Shore

Third term for Trump?
There are possibilities.

https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/other/trump-says-he-s-not-joking-about-serving-third-term-as-president-and-suggests-one-way-he-thinks-he-could-do-it/ar-AA1BXlBc?
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March 31, 2025 10:01am
- Ghost
  
  No, and there is no method he could run for vice president then be handed the role. Once you have served two terms thats it, you cannot run for vice president.
  
  16 1
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  March 31, 2025 10:07am
  - David Garrett
    
    Steve O: Perhaps he should try for permanent residence in the White House?
    
    8 4
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    March 31, 2025 10:09am
  - Steve Otto N Shore
    
    I think he is just playing that 3D chess again but who knows?
    I do think he will be too old to run efficiently in 2028, at age 82. Who knows? He is chugging along like a well oiled diesel right now.
    
    6 13
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    March 31, 2025 10:26am
    - sungsamning
      
      Yes, it’ll be a cold day in hell when Trump quits stirring.
      
      8 3
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      March 31, 2025 10:28am
    - RichardF
      
      Trump is playing poker, not chess.
      
      3 4
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      March 31, 2025 11:57am
      - Steve Otto N Shore
        
        Who holds the best cards?
        
        2 2
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        March 31, 2025 6:11pm
  - Manu-Rau
    
    Of course, many in the Democrat Establishment and their Deep State enablers still argue that Trump wasn’t actually ELECTED in 2016 (something about Russia….).
    
    According to them, 2024 was the first time for him.
    
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    March 31, 2025 10:34am
- sungsamning
  
  He is stirring. Most of the MAGA team know it. Dems heads are still exploding though.
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:24am
- RoboRob
  
  Actually I was thinking the other day that he might have the reverse plan. He could leave 1 day after the mid point of this term! Vance could then take over AND still have two terms of his own later.
  
  It is constitutionally possible as the rules allow a max of 10years or elected twice.
  
  Why would trump do this?
  1) He is getting older / is old
  2) Vance could be a great president and Trump could see that as part of his legacy.
  
  Just speculation though 🙂
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:35am
- Northshoredoc
  
  Trump is just trolling.
  
  Even he knows it’s not an option.
  
  5 5
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  March 31, 2025 11:34am
- NothingLeft
  
  This is just abject and politically destructive stupidity from Trump, who aside from constitutional limits is just too old.
  
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  March 31, 2025 11:40am
JamesSamuel

I was watching Question Time on TV last week (I know, I know but time hangs heavily on your hands when you’re retired) and I watched as the Speaker tried to restore some modicum of decorum to the House. To his constant cries of ‘Order, Order’ I swear I could hear Rawiri Waititi call out “I’ll have a double cheeseburger and chips thanks Gerry”.
Did anyone else catch it or was it just my imagination?
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March 31, 2025 10:05am
- pdm
  
  JS I am a regular watcher of QT too.
  
  Never caught that but, it would be stretching Waititi’s capabilities to think it up – someone must have told him to say it.
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:05pm
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360634116/wellington-mp-tamatha-paul-djs-cubadupa
Why is she wearing that scarf & headware ? Why does this article not mention it ? There is something seriously wrong with the Greens, especially the women. Nuts.
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March 31, 2025 10:15am
- sungsamning
  
  Reaction on the poll is 69% negative. Her opponent should use the video at election time.
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:27am
  - DeepBlue
    
    The 31% positive is all she cares about.
    
    5 0
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    March 31, 2025 12:34pm
    - MCōs
      
      31% would have the them right up with with the Nats
      
      0 0
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      March 31, 2025 8:33pm
  - Suze Wainwright
    
    Above all else, Tamatha must be portrayed as the real victim here…
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:19pm
- Steve Otto N Shore
  
  Maybe she is going to Palestine, or Iran?
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:28am
  - greybeard
    
    It is the implied anti-Semitic, anti-Israel stance which is the worry.
    
    13 3
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    March 31, 2025 10:32am
    - kowtow
      
      Of course it is . Even the file photo of disgraced Golriz in today’s Herald , sitting in the dock , shows her wearing a watermelon badge ( and no that’s not some sort of Green gallows humour (( they don’t do humour)) it was a statement in support of Hamas .
      
      These people really are despicable.
      
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      March 31, 2025 1:38pm
- imalwaysright
  
  The real story is Hipkins condemning her.
  He may be moving to take rational and populist positions, on issues such as this, in a move to eventually undermine Luxon on his pet issues such as Climate, treaty, rainbow etc.
  It wouldn’t take much for Chippy to fill the vacuum that Luxon is creating, especially when the rest of the world are abandoning these scams at a great rate.
  
  Also,Chippy is a better speaker than Luxon, he could pull it off.
  
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  March 31, 2025 10:44am
  - PurplePen
    
    I always find chippy comes across as manufactured concern and sincerity, and his policy stance only there because he thinks it will get him back in the govt, not because he genuinely thinks it’s actually policy that’s good for NZ.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:24pm
    - imalwaysright
      
      Exactly
      
      7 1
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      March 31, 2025 3:29pm
- rouppe
  
  The red and white one with tassels is actually a Jordanian shemagh. Apparently the biggest the tassels the more important the wearer.
  
  So it’s self aggrandizement, and she may well not know it’s Jordanian, not Palestinian.
  
  Though “from the river” refers to the river Jordan…
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:02pm
- kowtow
  
  Especially the women ?
  
  Have you not caught up on the latest scandal.
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:36pm
sungsamning

https://pjmedia.com/scott-pinsker/2025/03/30/can-we-stop-this-third-term-nonsense-if-trump-wants-to-be-great-he-needs-to-walk-away-n4938417
Can We Stop this ‘Third Term’ Nonsense? If Trump Wants to Be Great, He Needs to Walk Away.

It’s not entirely clear if he was real or fictional. Most historians believe he was probably real, but it’s tricky to verify: The legend of Lucius Cincinnatus was (enthusiastically) retold in Titus “Livy” Livius’ book, the “History of Rome,” which was written a few decades before Christ. Unquestionably, Livius’ book included real, verifiable, historic events, but it also included the mythology of the Trojan War and tales of magical twins suckled by a she-wolf.
[I agree. Its fun watching Dem heads explode though.]
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March 31, 2025 10:16am
- All_on_Red
  
  I cant find it but there are clips of Trump saying he has no intention of trying to extend his Term.
  Still, I’m sure the TDS Nutters will then say he’s just saying that…
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:42pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Just watched it on the news, he was doing a town hall and it looked like he was joking.
    
    He also answered a quandary stated I am not allowed to stand, he said he had raised heaps of money for the next election, but said he won’t be able to use it for his self
    
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    March 31, 2025 6:44pm
sungsamning

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2025/03/nearing_the_final_battle_against_the_deep_state.html
Nearing the Final Battle Against the Deep State.
While numerous federal district court judges have issued ill-conceived restraining orders against the administration, I have long believed that it will prevail in its efforts to place control of the state in the hands of the elected executive, away from the deep state bureaucracy and its black-robed judicial allies. As the litigation of these matters proceeds, I think my belief will be justified. We will return to a constitutional republican form of government.
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March 31, 2025 10:16am
cmm

The low NZ wage, high value people leaving and huge tax tie in with another problem we have looming – retirement.

The younger high value people are leaving. Those that are staying are mainly over 55 and retiring soon. Not only are their skills lost to the economy, but they are also going to need retirement either from the NZ Super or Kiwisaver etc.

Unfortunately the Kiwisaver system is hopeless. There is little incentive to earn and save extra. All earnings on savings are taxed – after which they are barely above inflation.

Each thousand $ of savings translates into $1 per week of retirement income. If you want $1000 per week then you need $1 million in savings.

The median 65 year old has less than $80k of savings – translating into $80 per week of income. That is a dismal failure and is not going to support anyone.

Clearly everyone is expecting to get the Super instead. That $600 or so per week (allowing for some inflation over the ext few years) is equivalent to having saved $600,000 during your working life.

To have saved $600k by age 65 over a 45 year working life would require having saved $10k a year.

So if we every have a hope of weening off Super, then we need to save more and incentivize doing so. One way to do that would be to make retirement savings tax free.

Currently people are paying tax on retirement savings at least twice – if not three times:
* when you earned it.
* company tax on any investments
* on the interest.
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March 31, 2025 11:15am
- Dudley Quaffquaff
  
  Why is it Government’s job to provide “incentives” to earn and save?
  
  Do you want to have money when you retire, or don’t you?
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:00pm
  - PurplePen
    
    The reality is there’s a lot of humans that only operate in the here and now or the very near future. To have them think further into their future might be achievable with an on-going education campaign.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:28pm
    - greybeard
      
      I am 76: when I was a pre-schooler I was aware of the P.O.S.B. ( Post Office Savings Bank ) having savings accounts for kids, as did all my peers. It was just a fact of life: you saved your pennies, as it was the thing to do.
      Just how much more “education” is required ?
      How long does it take to tell someone “you had better save for your future or you will be in trouble”?
      
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      March 31, 2025 4:21pm
- wsk12345
  
  I was thinking at the weekend that KiwiSaver does have one advantage to the gummint, even if people only have $100 k or less saved….it makes people ineligible for the accommodation supplement. As I understand you can only get that once you get down to less than $8 k in savings which presumably includes KS.
  
  If that is the case then anyone who will have a low balance at retirement is better to spend it now, surely?
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:55pm
- Quail
  
  KiwiSaver is a failure.
  Noted in my earlier posts today.
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:28pm
- MCōs
  
  “The median 65 year old has less than $80k of savings”
  Depends what you mean by savings.
  66% of Kiwis own a freehold home at aged 65, which is in excess of $900k
  
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  March 31, 2025 8:44pm
Ghost

Can’t see John winning this

The Whānau Ora Commissioning Agency is taking Te Puni Kōkiri to the High Court today, challenging its procurement process for Whānau Ora funding.

CEO John Tamihere says the case is about protecting 116 Māori partner organisations and hundreds of jobs, arguing the government’s process has put them at risk.

Article
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March 31, 2025 11:15am
- mandk
  
  Tamihere (and all other socialists) should be required to write 100 times every day, until they recant their stupidity: ‘The purpose of government funding is not to create jobs’.
  
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  March 31, 2025 11:20am
- cmm
  
  “116 Māori partner organisations”
  And each one has a CEO, board members, etc etc. Grift city.
  
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  March 31, 2025 11:27am
  - imalwaysright
    
    “…And each one has a CEO, board members, etc.”
    On paper anyway.
    In reality its probably a creative cousin spending an hour a day writing up bogus invoices and emailing them off to another less creative cousin for rubber stamping.
    The Great Robbery of NZ .
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:49am
  - mandk
    
    I wonder how many of them pay a kick-back to Tamihere a/o TPM.
    
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    March 31, 2025 11:53am
  - Keith White
    
    Out: “Cook a captive in a hangi and you keep him warm for the rest of his life.”
    
    In: “Teach an iwi to grift and they don’t have to work for the rest of their lives.”
    
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    March 31, 2025 12:55pm
  - kowtow
    
    There’s a job for any prospective “investigative journalist”
    
    How much does the so called Maori economy they bleat on about actually depend on hard working new Zealnder tax transfers.
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:35pm
- Swifty
  
  Quite why John Tamihere thought it appropriate that he be CEO of WOCA (an issuer of Whanau Ora funds) and simultaneously CEO of Waipareira (a recipient of Whanau Ora funds) escapes me.
  
  That must be what they call tikanga, I guess.
  
  The avoidance of perceived or actual conflicts of interest is just colonial oppression.
  
  In fact it’s racist.
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:16pm
- NothingLeft
  
  Govt has to stop paying for this shit. It’s only making the problems they claim to be solving worse and worse and worse, and creating an ever growing parasitical organism draining essential productivity and tax revenues from NZ.
  
  And the grasping hands will never love NZ for the money they give – they just double down on the hatred (after all it’s worked so well in filling their pockets and buying BMWs so far)
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:55pm
mandk

From the Herald about Green MP, Benjamin Doyle:
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-faces-immense-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account/JGFVVTGZY5D5VBCX6YXGO52IJU/

I can summon absolutely no sympathy for Doyle. [Mod – debate without that]
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March 31, 2025 11:51am
reason links 2 3 4

The modern and very real “Blood Libel”.

Libel is legally defined as – “a published false statement that is damaging to a person’s reputation; a written defamation.” ,,,, In common language it’s a smear, it’s lies told to make some-one look bad, it’s
done falsely to give a undeserved bad reputation, and lower any sympathy towards the target of the libel.

Blood libel is the lies told to gain consent, or lower objections, to the lethal violence conducted against the libeled (lied about) target…. violence, gore, blood & death.

… and there’s been a lot of Blood Libel pumped out for over a year now.

Claiming Hamas fighter beheaded 40 Babies on Oct 7th was Blood Libel.

Claiming Hamas fighters put Babies in Ovens ,, tore babies from wombs etc etc was Blood Libel.

Claiming Hamas fighters tied up and burnt to death captives when a Israeli tank killed them is Blood Libel

Claiming Hamas carried out large amounts of rape is blood libel ,,,–”the rape claims are unsubstantiated or outright fabrications – atrocity propaganda used to incite and justify Israel’s ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.” https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israel-still-cant-find-any-7-october-rape-victims-prosecutor-admits

Believe all or any of this modern ‘Blood Libel’ and you could well believe that Hamas are all ‘human garbage’ who should be wiped out/killed,,,, and it helps that we have labeled them terrorists….

…. ”The word “terrorist” is a meaningless tool of imperial narrative control.
Want to bomb some people? Designate them as terrorists.
Want to silence protesters and dissidents? Say they’re supporting terrorists.
Want sweeping surveillance powers? Say you need them to fight terrorism.”

One of the latest pieces of this by now very blood drenched Blood Libel is the claim that Hamas strangled the Bibi’s family with their bare terrorist hands ,,, a claim fronted by a Israeli doctor –

”Chen Kugel, a former Israeli military doctor who heads the Israeli National Forensic Institute of Medicine, announced that their examination “found no evidence of injuries caused by bombing.”
However, Chen Kugel had previously been caught repeatedly lying that he personally witnessed beheaded babies on October 7, despite the fact that only one Israeli baby was killed that day as a result of a stray bullet, and none were beheaded.”

I tend not to believe repeated liars,,,, but this latest bit of Blood Libel did the trick,, and Israel resumed their murder and maiming of civilians at an even more barbaric rate than before ,,,, Israel has deliberately killed over 15,000 children and injured over 34000 other ones,,, injured like this poor one ,, WARNING UPSETTING REALITY (to normal people) OF ISRAELS WORK DONE WITH WESTERN WEAPONS https://ragspassage.substack.com/p/aseel-two-phone-calls

Apart from showing the largely unreported time-line of the Bibis familys deaths ,,, this link https://www.uncaptured.media/p/did-israel-bomb-the-bibas-family contains a video full of Israeli hostage testimony about half way down the page ,,, ‘Is Israel Applying the Hanibal Directive to Captives and Hostages in the Gaza Strip?’ …..

With the Israelis own testimony’s it seems like a case of Ozcams 2000lb bombs ,,, or 500lb ones…

…The Israelis who want to get their job of genocide done ( as defined by The Convention on Genocide adopted in 1948) ,have used violence and intimidation against the family’s of hostages who speak out against the course and actions of Israels ‘hardest right’ Govt ,,,, https://www.uncaptured.media/p/netanyahu-and-kahanist-allies-wage ,,,,

families who attended a Knesset meeting were shouted down by Jewish Power party legislators and accused of being tools of the enemy……

“violence against those protesting for the release of the hostages. On October 16th, a right-wing passerby attacked Eli Albag, the father of an 18-year-old hostage, Liri, while he was at the hostage protest tent in Tel Aviv, calling him a “traitor” and saying, “I hope your daughter dies.” On October 29th, Chen Avigdori, whose wife, Sharon, and daughter Noam are being held hostage, reported that people came to a small daily vigil for the hostages and called the attendees “Nazis” and “Hamas.” A small vigil for the hostages in central Jerusalem on October 12th was violently dispersed by police, who arrested several of the participants. “[The police] came at us with tons and tons of violence—using their hands, pushing, punching,” said one attendee, Felipe, who asked that his last name be withheld for safety reasons. He said the police were shouting “go to Gaza!” as they attacked, and that he was thrown to the ground and repeatedly struck in the head and the stomach.

Anyway it’s well past time we told the Israel ambassador, with his Blood Libel, to take a hike ,, https://youtu.be/0qr_K8E5f_E

Although the Aussies ‘right wing’ seems to be wanting it to be an election issue https://youtu.be/te6ncrgU2gs ,,,, is theirs the winning position?
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March 31, 2025 12:21pm
- David Garrett
  
  And your source is what…Hamas? I don’t believe a word they say…and I take Israeli claims with a teaspoon of sale too.
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:10pm
- Allan
  
  Did Hamas soldiers behead anyone?
  
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  March 31, 2025 6:03pm
DimChappie

Chloe Swarbrick has called on PM Luxon to shut down Winston’s comments about Green MP Benjamin Doyle’s social media posts involving a child. The Centrist article below has the background.
I wonder what the PM will do – if he tries to muzzle Peters it won’t go well for Luxon.

https://tinyurl.com/34rcpsac

https://tinyurl.com/3hf2rt7j
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March 31, 2025 12:32pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  Go watch what he said on the news, he said it’s the green MPs that need to watch their talk snd behaviour
  
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  March 31, 2025 6:46pm
All_on_Red

DOGE has now identified millions of people who were getting Social Security and have now confirmed they are actually deceased.
‘Of that total (12m), roughly 3.2 million people now have been marked as being deceased, DOGE said with an update on its website.

“For the past two weeks, @SocialSecurity has begun a major cleanup of their records,” the announcement said. “Approximately 3.2 million number holders, all listed age 120+, have now been marked as deceased. More work still to be done.”
https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/social-security-database-doge/2025/03/18/id/1203290/

Someone’s been sitting at home collecting Grandads cheques.
They think there are millions more… They are saying any savings will be plowed back to those who are entitled to claim.
Its quite remarkable what a mess some of these places are in
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March 31, 2025 12:38pm
- rouppe
  
  I’m not entirely convinced that every person on the social security database not marked as deceased was by extension receiving payments.
  
  If they were I’m certain you’d be hearing about fraud cases being referred to police/courts
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:43pm
  - All_on_Red
    
    Give them a chance. They’ve only just discovered it.
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:45pm
  - artemisia
    
    I’m sure you are correct, but there was reference by the WH spox to a previous investigation that revealed the SSA paid out at least $71.8 billion in improper payments. And since the SSA data is clearly not universally accurate who knows if there are more improper payments. But chances are.
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:28pm
    - Dudley Quaffquaff
      
      That $71.8 billion was over seven years and represents less than 1% of the total budget
      
      https://apnews.com/article/social-security-payments-deceased-false-claims-doge-ed2885f5769f368853ac3615b4852cf7
      
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      March 31, 2025 4:19pm
- Dudley Quaffquaff
  
  No case has been identified of any such individual actually receiving any money.
  
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  March 31, 2025 12:58pm
  - All_on_Red
    
    Wrong
    DOGE have found 3.2m so far who were getting paid and are dead
    Where’s your evidence they are wrong?
    And use Citations for a change
    You seem to think your comments are proof- lol
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:47pm
    - rouppe
      
      The 3. 2 million refers to those aged 120+ who were not, but are now, marked as deceased.
      
      I can’t find a reference to them actually receiving benefits.
      
      That’s consistent between your link and this one.
      https://www.newsweek.com/doge-announces-major-cleanup-social-security-2046231
      
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      March 31, 2025 2:47pm
    - Hard Cheese
      
      Your cited article doesn’t even claim what you’re claiming. Where does it say they’ve been paying these people?
      
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      March 31, 2025 2:51pm
- kowtow
  
  AoR
  
  Were the dead actually receiving funds .
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:33pm
- Hard Cheese
  
  All it says is that they’ve found a lot of people with incorrect ages in their database and marked a big chunk of them as deceased. Nowhere does it say that they’ve been paying social security to these people. Why didn’t you mention this part of the article?
  
  Last month, Musk said millions of people well above the age of 100 could be collecting Social Security benefits.
  
  The SSA, however, has suggested those millions refer to many people who are not receiving benefits but “do not have a date of death associated with their record,” Newsweek reported.
  
  This stuff is just Musk pumping up his own tyres.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:49pm
Scooter

What are immense death threats exactly? Are there small death threats? Media really need to re school in basic English.

https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/politics/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-faces-immense-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account/
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March 31, 2025 12:39pm
- imalwaysright
  
  “Immense death threats”.
  It means to “immensely kill someone” or be “immensely dead”.
  In both cases it is really, really bad, times three. That’s the worst you can get, really.
  And if the rest of the Greens weren’t nuts or under police investigation you can be sure there would be hell to pay!!!
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:59pm
  - Don Beckett
    
    Shit yes – being “Immensely dead” is way, way worse than being “Just dead”. //
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:27pm
- PurplePen
  
  I’m guessing, but I think they mean lots. Or maybe it means lots that are very very graphic as opposed to lots that are not graphic at all. Who knows what the journalist meant. You would think the editor would pick up on this.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:32pm
AitchW

I see that Newstalk ZB is reporting on threats made against Benjamin Doyle.
The Green leadership minimising the seriousness of his social media posts, instead focussing on the reaction to them.
Is this the thin end of the wedge?
Is this story about to grow legs?
https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/news/politics/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-faces-immense-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account/
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March 31, 2025 12:45pm
- grumpy
  
  Were these the same “treats” made to Cloe, Dana, Golriz etc…… convenient! Lets see them.
  
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  March 31, 2025 4:41pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  And they trying to say the pic are his child, not don or daughter.
  
  In the pics I have seen, he is kissing a young girl on the lips, and 2 separate kids sitting on his knees.
  
  Swarbrick had the look of death on her face
  
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  March 31, 2025 6:50pm
  - Ghost
    
    It’s his son and it’s the same child
    
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    March 31, 2025 9:00pm
Swifty

Spin, spin, spin from the Greens.

The issue is not, as they claim, about whether his use of the account was before he was an MP – the issue is whether this person is an appropriate choice as an MP in our Parliament given his clear predilection for posting about the celebration of young male anuses on social media.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-faces-immense-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account/JGFVVTGZY5D5VBCX6YXGO52IJU/

Can you just imagine the righteous fury that would explode from the Greens should it have been a Nat or ACT MP extolling the virtues of the female equivalent?

If the Greens didn’t have double-standards they’d have no standards at all.
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March 31, 2025 12:46pm
- Ghost
  
  I wonder swifty is a disconnect with the meaning behind the word.
  
  Article
  
  For many gay men, the word “bussy” is a normal part of everyday language. But what happens when the word crosses over into straight culture?
  
  As with many slang terms that originated in queer culture (and especially Black queer culture), the term “bussy” has been crossing over into mainstream culture a lot more in recent years. So much so that the term is starting to become watered down. But what does it originally mean?
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:41pm
  - Yabster
    
    what?- theres way more to it that the term bussy- the pics and emojis, the deleted posts, have a read of Ian Wisharts article- one of best journalists in nz -fairly damning- esp around the above and the blue swirl and cheese (cp refs)- fairly clear.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:25pm
    - Ghost
      
      Boy love is a triangle symbol. Cyclone emoji is according to urban dictionary used by maori
      
      https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=%F0%9F%8C%80
      
      Sometimes accusations are best left to police to look into and not the public.
      
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      March 31, 2025 2:59pm
      - Yabster
        
        did you read the article- seems not.
        
        Global internet security company ActiveFence says the blue spiral in social media chat is used by pedophiles to signal themselves to like minds.
        
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        March 31, 2025 3:12pm
      - Ghost
        
        Actually I did read it, and the symbol actually is used by maori.
        
        https://www.instagram.com/maoriworldwide/. Are you going to claim that account is a boy love account due to their overuse of the symbol
        
        These claims are best left to the police and not the public
        
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        March 31, 2025 3:32pm
  - Swifty
    
    I don’t get your point, sorry.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:48pm
    - Ghost
      
      Bussy is a term for an adult males ahole, it’s been around for a long time
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:09pm
      - Swifty
        
        Still don’t.
        
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        March 31, 2025 3:40pm
  - rouppe
    
    It might be a normal part of lgbtqi everyday language.
    
    But it still means “boy pussy”, ie their anus.
    
    When you post that alongside a picture of you with a male child, the intention is clear.
    
    Remember the outrage when Trump said “you can grab them by the pussy”? The outrage with his casual sexual references to women in general?
    
    This is exactly the same thing. That he’s referring to a child is disgusting. That makes him a paedophile.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:56pm
  - keepcalmcarryon
    
    I wonder how the greens get to gaslight everyone else that it’s only the alphabet people who have a magical different meaning for very very suspect language and it’s the public’s fault for not being supportive of the repressed minority.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:15pm
    - Ghost
      
      It’s meant that for a long time, as well as butt pussy.
      
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      March 31, 2025 5:17pm
- David Garrett
  
  Swifty: I made my comment later in this thread unaware that you had made the same point earlier.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:01pm
  - Swifty
    
    No probs.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:48pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    What was he doing kissing a young girl on the lips in one pic
    
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    March 31, 2025 6:54pm
- PurplePen
  
  The usual hypocrisy. Does anyone recall the castigation from MSM and likely the Greens when David Seymour replied to questions from under-aged people on snapchat.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:35pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    They tried to pay their part to shaft Bishop with a load of bollocks about him talking to a young person asking him about politics
    
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    March 31, 2025 6:56pm
- alex Masterley
  
  I think the cat is now officially amongst the pigeons.
  It will be interesting to see if the main stream media go after the MP in question as they did Aaron Gilmore or as they did regular commenter David Garrett.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:39pm
Swifty

The man has to go, surely.

“X users, including notable right-wing social media influencer Chantelle Baker, have posted screenshots from the now-locked profile which show Doyle posing with a child, understood to be their own, one of which was posted with the caption “Bussy galore”.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360634318/green-mp-benajmin-doyle-facing-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account

Again, swap it to a Nat or ACT MP doing the same with their daughter on their knee.

Horrifying.

The man is toast.

The Greens are welcome to retain and protect him however, but will attract an ongoing firestorm should they do.
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March 31, 2025 12:53pm
- Keith White
  
  I hope he’s more than toast. He should metaphorically be charcoal.
  
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  March 31, 2025 4:01pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  There was not just one kid
  
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  March 31, 2025 6:57pm
NothingLeft

Imagine how fast and cheap robots are going to be able to build infrastructure tunnels in a few years – when we don’t have to worry about worker safety, and when special purpose robots 10x as strong and tough as humans can do the work. The costs will come down by at least a factor of 10.

Auckland and Wellington will finally be able to fix their infrastructure issues.
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March 31, 2025 1:09pm
- imalwaysright
  
  Already here. We know them as taxpayers.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:03pm
- cmm
  
  “Imagine how fast and cheap robots are going to be able to build infrastructure tunnels in a few years – when we don’t have to worry about worker safety, and when special purpose robots 10x as strong and tough as humans can do the work.”
  
  Fanciful.
  
  We already have all the technology to do that now without endangering people.
  Drilling machinery can be operated from long distances with no need for anyone to go underground.
  
  But cheap? Nope, it gets more and more expensive all the time. I don’t know why you think it will get cheaper.
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:13pm
Suze Wainwright

Is it true that Chlöe Swarbrick identifies as Queer and not a common, garden variety Lesbian or Bisexual?
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March 31, 2025 1:24pm
- David Garrett
  
  Suze: Perhaps she identifies as a cat? Or a pussy…
  
  She looks vaguely cat-like
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:05pm
  - Yabster
    
    certainly feral…
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:37pm
  - PurplePen
    
    A lesson to us all. Don’t identify as a cat when you get pulled over by USA traffic police .. less than 1 minute video
    
    https://youtu.be/gCs5Ey7giN0
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:39pm
    - kowtow
      
      PP
      
      Did you see pikachu running from Turkish security forces in Constantinople.
      
      If it weren’t so sad ( the Islamification of Anatolia) it would be funny.
      
      3 1
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      March 31, 2025 3:42pm
  - Suze Wainwright
    
    Well it appears she’s been extremely bussy all weekend working on deflection and victimhood strategies.
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:46pm
    - NeverMindTheBollocks
      
      Busy? Bossy?
      
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      March 31, 2025 11:06pm
  - Keith White
    
    Quo Vadis, Swarbrickoides?
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:01pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  Probably, she will want to be one of the letters
  
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  March 31, 2025 6:57pm
Bridgenag

SENT TO ME

THE GREAT MAORI EDUCATION RACKET – A STATE FUNDED FARCE – Tui Vaeau

One could be forgiven for thinking that education in New Zealand is about preparing children for success, arming them with the knowledge and skills to thrive in an unforgiving world. BUT NO, THAT QUAINT NOTION HAS BEEN TOSSED ASIDE IN FAVOUR OF RACIAL INDULGENCE ON AN INDUSTRIAL SCALE. The latest fawning piece in The Post sings the praises of Maori-medium schooling, an insular, state-funded vanity project THAT SERVES NO PURPOSE BEYOND APPEASING THE USUAL PROFESSIONAL GRIEVANCE-MONGERS.

For the avoidance of doubt, let us be absolutely clear: the explosion of Maori “education” is not about academic excellence. It is not about opportunity. It is not even about preparing children for a productive future. IT IS ABOUT SEPARATISM, RACIAL DIVISION, AND THE SLOW BUT STEADY DISMANTLING OF A COHESIVE NEW ZEALAND in favour of a taxpayer-funded Maori aristocracy that feeds off endless handouts while contributing nothing of real value.

THE SHEER SCALE OF THIS RACKET IS STAGGERING. In just a decade, the roll at these Maori schools has more than doubled, propped up by a political class too spineless to say what everyone knows: this is not education, it is indoctrination. Children are not being taught to compete in the global economy. They are not being given the tools to innovate, create, or lead in any meaningful way. No, THEY ARE BEING TAUGHT A DEAD-END IDEOLOGY that reduces their entire existence to a racial identity and sets them up for failure in a world that does not give a damn about “Maoridom.”

THE FACT THAT THIS NONSENSE IS ALLOWED TO CONTINUE, LET ALONE CELEBRATED, IS PROOF OF HOW UTTERLY CAPTURED THE POLITICAL ESTABLISHMENT HAS BECOME BY THE MAORI LOBBY. The article boasts of Maori schools hitting “capacity” – as if this were some sign of achievement rather than a glaring red flag. State-integrated faith-based schools, which have produced generations of productive citizens, are struggling or closing altogether.

Meanwhile, Maori schools – despite offering nothing of tangible value – continue to expand, with THE GOVERNMENT THROWING MONEY AT THEM LIKE A DRUNKEN SAILOR on shore leave.

The figures are damning. Over 27,000 students are now trapped in this system, severed from the real world, taught in A LANGUAGE THAT OFFERS THEM NO GENUINE ECONOMIC OR PROFESSIONAL ADVANTAGE. The supposed “success” of these schools is measured not by academic rigour, but by “90% achievement rates” in NCEA – an utterly meaningless statistic in a system where one can pass without ever learning anything of substance.

The real test of success is employment, economic productivity, and contribution to society. But that, of course, is never mentioned.

And what is the grand ambition of this movement? To produce “leaders of Maoridom,” whatever that means. Where, exactly, is “Maoridom”? Is it a nation? A functioning economy? A global player in science, technology, or business? No. IT IS A POLITICAL CONSTRUCT, A GRIEVANCE INDUSTRY DESIGNED TO MILK THE TAXPAYER FOR ALL HE IS WORTH while shielding an entire class of people from the consequences of their own choices.

The Maori lobby will, of course, wail and moan at any attempt to impose basic standards or limit their state-funded separatism. The very notion of an enrolment scheme to manage these ballooning rolls is met with outrage, as if Maori are entitled to infinite state resources while the rest of the country is expected to make do with what it has.

The Ministry of Education timidly suggests restrictions, only to be met with the predictable howls of victimhood from those who have mastered the art of extracting ever-greater sums of money FROM A SPINELESS GOVERNMENT.

But the real crime here is not just the waste of money. IT IS THE DELIBERATE SABOTAGE OF MAORI CHILDREN, condemned to a future where they are taught to see themselves as a separate, entitled class rather than as individuals capable of success through their own efforts. It is a betrayal of the very principles that once made this country great – hard work, integration, and a commitment to excellence over racial sentimentality.

IT IS HIGH TIME WE CALLED THIS ABSURDITY WHAT IT IS: A STATE-FUNDED EXERCISE IN RACIAL NARCISSISM. If Maori parents wish to indulge in this fantasy, they are welcome to do so – on their own dime. The rest of New Zealand should not be paying for it. If we are serious about building a successful, united nation, then this separatist nonsense must end.

English, mathematics, science, and personal responsibility – these are the only foundations of success. Everything else is a taxpayer-funded diversion.

Tui’s article refers to this Post article > https://www.thepost.co.nz/nz-news/360603145/zone-out-how-maori-education-affecting-school-rolls

Tui Vaeau is a digital marketer with a background in real estate and security. Unmoved by the fashionable absurdities of modern politics, he stands for national cohesion and the principle that all New Zealanders should be treated as equals. His views are forthright, unswayed by ideological theatrics, and firmly grounded in reality.
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March 31, 2025 1:25pm
imalwaysright

This is weird from the Greens, unsurprisingly.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-faces-immense-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account/JGFVVTGZY5D5VBCX6YXGO52IJU/

They say the word Bussy refers to a mans anus. Clearly a play on pussy.
Then why wouldn’t they call it Mussy ?
What does the B stand for I wonder ?
[Mod – deleted]
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March 31, 2025 1:29pm
cmm

Is Bussygate going to backfire on Chloe?

They would seem to be between a rock and a hard place.

How do you justify what Doyle posted (private or not) without appearing to condone paedo behaviour?

How do you give people confidence in Green MPs without saying that you stuffed up in your selection process?

I think the LGBTQ+ victim card is wearing a bit thin. This is 2025. Nobody cares what you have in your pants and what you do with it, but leave the kids out of it.
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March 31, 2025 1:33pm
- k1w1
  
  I see the Greens (and msm) going in to bat for Doyle by playing the “he’s had death threats!” card, rather than look at the actual issue. Greens once again showing their lunacy.
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:37pm
- David Garrett
  
  cmm: I just wonder what this utterly confused paragraph about the newest Green freak of nature MP means:
  
  “The central conspiracy here is that the use of such a word on a private account by an MP, before they were an MP, is inherently suspicious”
  
  Is Ms Swarbrick saying that it is “suspicious” that people are looking at what said freak posted before it was elected? Or does she mean – perhaps sub-consciously – that using terms such phrases as “bussy galore” – apparently gay for “lots of gay pussy” – alongside pictures of its son are inherently “suspicious”?
  
  If behaviour before one is elected an MP is to be ignored, Meteria Turei and I should perhaps apply to have our seats restored.
  
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  March 31, 2025 1:40pm
  - k1w1
    
    I see Swarbrick is defending Doyle to the last them. Pathetic. Shes not interested in the meaning of the words he used. Ummm, why not? So she thinks his terminology is acceptable, in other words. Charming woman. And btw, it’s a portmanteau of “boy” and “pussy” in the gay community. Make of that what you will.
    
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    March 31, 2025 1:42pm
    - AitchW
      
      I do wonder if, after a few days have passed, Doyle might announce that he has resigned as am MP “to put an end to distractions from the Green Party’s work”? Absolutely nothing that remotely resembles an acknowledgement that his earlier posts were inadvisable.
      God knows what fresh horrors they have on the list to replace him….
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:54pm
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Well, if he is the 36 year old arrested for similar activity in the weekend then he won’t have much choice
        
        2 1
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        March 31, 2025 7:04pm
      - Ghost
        
        This is why people need to stop putting things together and leave it to the police
        
        This case involved a 36 year old man caught pretending to be an 11 year old girl having two girls sending him videos
        
        Doyle is 32 or 33 years old. Would take you seconds to Google and find the age, but here you are pushing this story
        
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        March 31, 2025 8:57pm
    - kowtow
      
      k1w1
      
      Another issue surely is the twitter name used ;
      
      “Biblebeltbussy”
      
      There’s so much in that name to “unpack” as they say .
      
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      March 31, 2025 5:25pm
  - cmm
    
    DG: I am certainly no expert in the field, but as I understand it “bussy” means male bottoms, particularly younger ones, in the context of having sex with them.
    
    I may be completely off, but as I understand it, [Mod – deleted unless this can be verified]
    
    Now imagine if your good self had posted a picture of your toddler daughter with “pussy galore” on it.
    
    Can you see anyone from Act having gone in to bat for you?
    
    I think Chloe was stupid here. She should have thrown the (inaudible) under the bus. Maybe he has some knowledge of dirty laundry?
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:06pm
  - cmm
    
    Interesting…
    My above post has been tagged “Your comment is awaiting moderation”.
    
    I am not sure, but I think the only way that can happen is if many people report the post.
    
    It would seem there are people trying to prevent discussion of this topic.
    
    [Mod – I put it into moderation while I tried to verify a claim you had made in your post]
    
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    March 31, 2025 2:09pm
  - alex Masterley
    
    DG, I suspect the Greens are trying to baffle with bullshit in an effort to make this issue go away.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:54pm
- kowtow
  
  When the msm do their indepth coverage of Bussygate no doubt they’ll list all the other Green MPs who shared likes or whatever they call them on those accounts ………
  
  …….in the exact same way they’d hold National or Act MPs to account ………
  
  And no doubt there’ll be endless news articles about the Greens shoddy selection process , in the way they did about the Nats when they were going through MP’s in the poop when they were in opposition …….
  
  No I’m not holding my breath .
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:46pm
  - Keith White
    
    [Mod – debate topics, and drop the abuse]
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:03pm
  - imalwaysright
    
    The real danger of the msm coverage is that they will minimise the seriousness of the act of a grown man having sex with a young boy and therefore be one step further on the road to it being tolerable behaviour.
    Just imagine the next time a case such as this comes up, the shock factor will be much reduced.
    That may be the game plan unfortunately.
    
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    March 31, 2025 5:13pm
Chuck Bird

I hope this is allowed to stay up. Commenters should understand defamamation as does Peters when he was on The Platform.

Doyle wants children to be able to get puberty blockers, which is harmful. Matt Doocey also has some strange ideas about his children choosing their own gender while they are still children.

Green MP Benjamin Doyle faces ‘immense’ death threats and abuse over social media account

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/green-mp-benjamin-doyle-faces-immense-death-threats-and-abuse-over-social-media-account/JGFVVTGZY5D5VBCX6YXGO52IJU/
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March 31, 2025 1:39pm
Conservatarian

I won’t check myself, and I highly doubt it, but have any of the corporate press vultures picked Bussygate up yet?

Or it is just Centrist / The Platform / RCR / selected X accounts, etc?
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March 31, 2025 1:42pm
- kowtow
  
  Cons.
  
  It led the 1 o’clock nzme radio news . The boss tells me it’s on $1uffed.
  
  I’d say Ryan Bridge will cover on the 4 o’clock slot.
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:36pm
  - Conservatarian
    
    Fantastic. Just off to get some popcorn.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:01pm
  - kowtow
    
    Oh dear Ryan is covering it , but using “preferred” pronouns .
    
    That’s f@#ken nuts.
    
    Hopefully Grenon sorts this nonsense .
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:34pm
David Garrett

And now this from Ms Swarbrick:

“She said she wasn’t interested in explaining the definition of some of the words used by Doyle.”

Well I am certainly bloody “interested” Ms Swarbrick. Imagine if there was a photo of a male MP – Oh I don’t know, say Mr Uffindell, the former school bully – next to a pic of a comely adolescent girl, with the caption “fresh meat”…or perhaps “fresh pussy”, which as I understand it is the closest translation to “bussy galore”.

I would be able to hear the outcry 1500 ks away here in the Kingdom.
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March 31, 2025 1:53pm
- Suze Wainwright
  
  Maybe she needs to explain the twirly blue emoji that Mr Doyle so seems to fancy.
  
  It appears that it has a very clear meaning to those in the know…
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:48pm
  - Ghost
    
    https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=%F0%9F%8C%80
    
    frequently used on maori social media as a representation of their culture.
    
    How about we leave the police to look into this and not the public
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:17pm
    - Suze Wainwright
      
      Doyle’s emoji is a little bit different from that one, but it would be understandable if them said it was Maori in the hope of claiming acceptance and legitimacy…
      
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      March 31, 2025 3:50pm
      - Ghost
        
        That is the same emoji that other maori instagram accounts use it.
        
        https://www.instagram.com/maoriworldwide/
        
        It’s time now for people to stop adding to this and leave it up to the police
        
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        March 31, 2025 4:07pm
      - kowtow
        
        Peters called out his using “Kauri” as his name when Peters said it’s actually Cody !
        
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        March 31, 2025 4:45pm
    - grumpy
      
      That is only ONE of the meanings and not the one intended when looking at his posts in context.
      Nice try – no cigar…..(as Bill Clinton would say)
      
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      March 31, 2025 4:34pm
      - Ghost
        
        You mean when reading his posts in your already made up mind of what it means. There is a reason why I have said people need to leave this to the police. You’ve already tried and convicted him
        
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        March 31, 2025 5:24pm
  - kowtow
    
    “Explain”
    
    Oh come on ! The news describe the guy by his “chosen” or whatever pronouns “they” , when he’s a he. There’s no such thing as a they!
    
    The Greens are now making him out to be some sort of victim who must be left alone .
    
    They are despicable.
    
    Swarbrick is now making her side out to be a victimised minority , in need , deserving of protection .
    
    yet she makes a virtue out of literally ( verbally) attacking all manner of other groups etc constantly .
    
    The hypocrisy is astounding .
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:34pm
    - Prince
      
      Indeed. ‘OK Boomer’ was widely pounced on by the Media and the Greens as being so witty and clever.
      But apparently we must never point out the actual meaning of this clown’s posts.
      
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      March 31, 2025 5:18pm
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        That’s how stupid the woman is, Muller was about 6 years too younger to be a boomer, the idiots had not idea
        
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        March 31, 2025 7:10pm
    - imalwaysright
      
      Correct, the pronouns are he, she or it.
      They are too vain to call themselves “it”, that would be too close to the truth.
      
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      March 31, 2025 5:22pm
- Bobba Fret
  
  I wonder if the Google search engine has a large number of searches on the word “bussy” this week?
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:51pm
- rouppe
  
  “pussy galore” would be the closest translation
  
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  March 31, 2025 2:59pm
  - kowtow
    
    No , Pussy Galore was/is a fictional woman in a Bond book . In the movie Goldfinger played by Honor Blackman .
    
    Of course there was innuendo in the name for a beautiful woman . But that was to do with normal , heterosexual relationships .
    
    There is nothing remotely close about that to the current issue , which is actually sickening. And potentially criminal.
    
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    March 31, 2025 3:54pm
graham

Oh dear … Green MP Tamatha Paul just doesn’t seem to understand the concept of “when you’re in a hole, stop digging.”

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/green-mp-tamatha-paul-plays-anti-police-songs-after-beat-cop-comments/FCJRNYLS3VAGPH3KG4UCF6MX2Y/

A Green politician under fire for her comments about police has played multiple anti-cop anthems during a DJ set in Wellington over the weekend.

What with this and the news about Benjamin Doyle hitting the headlines, looks like being an “interesting” week for the Greens …
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March 31, 2025 2:14pm
- Gravelroad
  
  They just don’t care – The Green Party.
  It has sunk into a Marxist activists outfit whose only agenda is the destruction of civil society.
  Ms Swarbrick may come across as a pleasant, even rational, person, but she is their leader.
  Don’t forget that next time you see her on the news saying “move along, nothing to see here”.
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:05pm
  - kowtow
    
    GR
    
    If you see the footage of her at the Auckland Hamas demo, the one where Twyford was forced off the stage and needed a police escort . she screeched “river to sea” and was anything but pleasant or rational.
    
    Quite the opposite .
    
    These are very dangerous people . Extremists.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:43pm
- zulumonster
  
  I wonder if Benjamin liked Tamatha’s post about people being scared of the police – would be understandable if he is concerned about them for himself …
  
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  March 31, 2025 4:24pm
NZL Fusion

I have some banking questions about the new account ID system designed to stop scammers. Apparently it’s only for domestic accounts, not international. There is no provision for the “trading as” name? I have used the same account for all business transactions for 30 years. In the last month almost everyone is having trouble paying me.
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March 31, 2025 2:26pm
- rouppe
  
  All the api can do is check the name of the account referenced by the account number.
  
  If they don’t match it’s a fail. So either change your payment instructions, or the account name so that they match each other.
  
  Expanding the check to also look at “trading name” if the account holder name doesn’t match could be something you ask the bank to do. But that won’t be as quick as fixing your account.
  
  Talk to your banking person.
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:05pm
  - Tauhei Notts
    
    Talk to your banking person.
    And be on hold for 35 or more minutes.
    Rouppe, you may have plenty of time to waste like that, but many of us do not.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:46pm
    - rouppe
      
      Depends how much time he’s wasting fixing the payments issue from his clients.
      
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      March 31, 2025 5:59pm
- cmm
  
  You need to ask the bank what that ID is.
  You then need to ensure that people pay using EXACTLY that name.
  
  If you have a TA name for your business, then set up a business account under that name.
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:30pm
Steve Todd

Karl Tiefenbacher has put his hat in the ring to contest the Wellington City mayoralty (and will also stand for council in the Motukairangi/Eastern General Ward). (See https://wellington.scoop.co.nz/?p=169135&cpage=1#comment-1833515.)

Kiwibloggers will recall Tiefenbacher stood in the Pukehīnau/Lambton General Ward by-election on 17 February 2024, which he lost by just 45 votes. (See https://wellington.govt.nz/-/media/your-council/elections/2023/lambton-ward-by-election/results/final/2024-pukehinau-lambton-general-ward-by-election-final-report.pdf?.)

So, we now have three main candidates for mayor, being Tiefenbacher (centre-right (CR) independent), incumbent Tory Whanau (Green) and Cr Ray Chung (CR independent).

Tiefenbacher told Nick Mills this morning that work is going on in the background to put up candidates who, if elected, would be aligned with him (or words to that effect).

At last, things are getting interesting on the local elections front in good ol’ Welling town.
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March 31, 2025 3:04pm
- Yabster
  
  you forgot the (L) beside Whanau.. how come? happy to add a CR to the other candidates?
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:16pm
  - Steve Todd
    
    … [Just debate the topic. mod.]
    
    I labelled Tiefenbacher and Chung as ‘CR independent’, so that Kiwibloggers know where on the political spectrum (in my view) these two independent candidates are positioned.
    
    I labelled Tory Whanau as Green (rather than L), because she has rejoined the Green Party and will be standing as the Greens’ candidate for mayor in October.
    
    Furthermore, the great majority of Kiwiblog commenters equate the Greens with ‘L’, if not ‘FL’ (far left), so it would not have been correct for me to label her as ‘L’.
    
    Got it?
    
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    March 31, 2025 5:39pm
- Bobba Fret
  
  What if Tiefenbacher and Chung split the right vote and Tory gets back in?
  
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  March 31, 2025 3:22pm
  - mandk
    
    Wellington elections are according to STV, so it shouldn’t happen if voters express their order of preference.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:06pm
  - muzled
    
    That would be hilarious to all us non Wellingtonians…
    
    Pretty sure Tory doesn’t want to get back in anyway, the job is way too much like hard work.
    
    Not to mention there is an almost certain opening in her beloved freakshow party coming available any minute now.
    
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    March 31, 2025 4:17pm
Chuck Bird

I think Straight Talk on Family First will be interesting tonight.
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March 31, 2025 3:32pm
mandk

“Claiming Hamas fighter beheaded 40 Babies on Oct 7th was Blood Libel”

Perhaps you could provide a source for this claim. Electronicintifada is not a credible source, given that a principle of Islam is taqiyya.

Or is it just a blood libel of your own?
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March 31, 2025 4:00pm
Keith White

https://centrist.nz/open-letter-to-nz-media-on-green-mp-benjamin-doyle/

This is a very detailed, and therefore quite sickening, catalogue (by Ian Wishart) of the entire scandal, which was steadfastly ignored by the NZ media until they could no longer avoid it.

It’s horribly worrying that this ‘person’ Doyle is in any way, shape or form in the NZ Govt and funded by the NZ taxpayer.
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March 31, 2025 4:09pm
- Gravelroad
  
  There was a person on newstalkzb this evening, during what was the HDPA time-slot, who was introduced as the leader of a gay pride organisation. Ben Goodsir (think that was his name].
  It was painful to listen to his waffle and word salad trying to deflect from the Green MP’s social media exhibitionism – using terms all very normal in the gay community apparently – but can’t expect others to understand it.
  Mr Coyle MP just a really good gay community guy and the fact that the Green Party chose him/her/them as their Early Childhood Education spokesperson was of no significance at all.
  Nice.
  Contrast that with the pile-on
  treatment of Mr Uffindell who was heavily criticised by politicians and the media for alleged bullying he was involved with when he was a teenager.
  Hypocrisy all round.
  
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  March 31, 2025 6:38pm
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/world-news/360635314/taliban-leader-says-there-no-need-western-laws-afghanistan
But in spite of all this, we will still let them play cricket with the rest of the world.
Because cricket trumps everything else.
This place is even worse than North Korea, and should be isolated, blacklisted, ignored and left to self-destruct.
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March 31, 2025 4:29pm
Tauhei Notts

The company is owned by that man, his ex-wife and their family trust. Him, her and the three trustees will each individually have to give the bank proof of their residential address, photographic identity and complete a seven page form to do that.
These anti-money laundering regulations are the stuff of nightmares.
Been there. Done that. Bought the tee-shirt.
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March 31, 2025 4:53pm
Mapsmith

Just listened to The PM’s afternoon press conference. I didn’t realize how bad these have become and doubt I will bother listening to another. I thought Luxon actually handled it all quite well, better than I expected. He must have the patience of Jove because the media came across as an undisciplined rabble of pre-schoolers, talking across each other, and many of them asking inane questions that even I already knew the answer to. And it sounded like a number must be members of the Benjamin Doyle fan club as they seemed to think he was the victim and that Winston should be called out for voicing his concerns about Doyles social media posts. Anyway I didn’t learn a thing, complete waste of my time and everyone else’s I suspect.
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March 31, 2025 5:32pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  Now you know why often Luxon pushes away from answering media, he know they try to trap him, hopefully people start realise what scum the media have become
  
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  March 31, 2025 7:19pm
Swifty

Senior gang member, knowingly and deliberately thrusts a knife in the torso and chest cavities of two strangers, disembowelling one and killing the second.

Out in a couple of years.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/crime/ex-gang-member-george-pikaahu-granted-parole-after-25-years-for-blenheim-manslaughter/7BWXAMW4M5HFLHZW2U2ITETVP4/

For the life of me I cannot understand why this was manslaughter nor the way the innocent victims are discarded like dirt with such a light sentence.

We have become a joke.
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March 31, 2025 6:46pm
septic skeptic

Luxon says the language used was “inappropriate” Was that his Prince Andrew moment? Like when Andy said he decided ti cut ties with Epstein once he thought he might have been doing something “unbecoming”? FFS Luxon should grow a pair and say that such sexualised posts involving a child raise serious concerns and deserve proper investigation. And if he said that, he could also add that so do any death threats made by idiots – for balance.
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March 31, 2025 7:51pm
than

https://centrist.nz/open-letter-to-nz-media-on-green-mp-benjamin-doyle/
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March 31, 2025 8:24pm
MCōs

Benjamin Doyle, a highly unusual person as for a number of reasons has been an MP since 22 October 2024, but it’s only today that Winston has chosen to have a crack at their background, so to speak
Coincidentally the same day he announces his wish washy proposal to replace the Interislander, that adds up to slightly less than that which Willis scraped at ultimately pretty much the same or more cost
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March 31, 2025 11:27pm

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