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April 30, 2025 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 30 April 2025

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NeverMindTheBollocks

An immigration adviser says she was naïve in filing visa applications for Chinese workers who later found their promised jobs did not exist.”

“She has stopped cooperation with such agents, as she has found she cannot trust what they say”

No shit, Sherlock.

This will be the tip of the iceberg. With the exception of RSE workers, we should stop all low paid wage immigration.

http://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/559435/immigration-adviser-fined-for-rubber-stamping-applications-of-scammed-migrants
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April 30, 2025 8:01am
- Conservatarian
  
  But this would considerably slow the Great Replacement of Western Culture. Elites would be extremely distressed at this prospect.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:06am
  - BananaLlama
    
    I can already hear their groans of agony at thought of no more uber drivers and bottle shop owners.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:52am
- cmm
  
  Quite.
  If you can’t fill out the forms and navigate the Immigration process then we don’t need you as an immigrant. Immigration consultants should be done away with.
  RSE workers are not immigrants per se, being only temporary.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:14am
  - imalwaysright
    
    That’s correct. Filling out forms by hand should be mandatory to show comprehension, reading, and writing skills.
    If the application is substandard then it gets binned.
    Maybe get them to sit NZ high school leavers exams in science, English, and maths.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:28am
  - Local Miller
    
    Nonsense, I’m by no means a dummy and my family and I have made a significant contribution to NZ in the almost 20 years we have been here. I work as a Database Consultant and command an excellent salary in the top 5% of NZ. I use a pseudonym because my name is very well known in the industry. This is not boasting, this is fact, reported to me by others, and I don’t want some left leaning company to decide they won’t work with our company because of my political and moral stand.
    Despite my own ability, I chose to use an Immigration Consultant when we came to NZ. When I initially started working through the process myself I realised there are a lot of ways that a simple mistake can result in your not getting a visa and I wasn’t prepared to take that risk. It makes sense to use a specialist when you aren’t one in an area, and the effective cost of failure is higher than the cost of paying someone else.
    Yes, there are shady consultants, and these should be rooted out and charged/stopped, but there are some excellent consultants and I’d recommend the one I used any day.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:52am
    - Taieri
      
      It makes sense to use a specialist when you aren’t one in an area
      ————-
      
      Nothing “specialist” in filing simple forms and gathering necessary documentation. We have done it for my current partner without any problems and without having to pay extortionate “consultant” fees.
      And I’m just a simple (now retired) marine engineer, with an ability to read and write.
      
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      April 30, 2025 1:42pm
- Media hater
  
  In my personal experience, virtually all immigration advisers/lawyers are spivs and wide boys to use a couple of old fashioned terms.
  
  It is an ‘industry’ that attracts bullshit artists. Even the allegedly respectable, industry spokespeople types, couldnt be trusted as far as you could throw them.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:05am
  - Local Miller
    
    In my personal experience none of the 4 to 5 immigration advisors I’ve worked with are spivs. Neither the one that helped me, nor the 3 I worked with while I was helping others settle in NZ, nor the one my son’s wife and family worked with when they arranged her families immigration.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:58am
    - Media hater
      
      Based on the summary of your credentials in the previous post, it seems that you probably would not have had any problems meeting specific criteria anyway.
      
      It sounds like you would be an ideal client and no need to inflate your abilities/background. I am happy your immigration experience involved no spivs or bullshit artists, lol.
      
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      April 30, 2025 12:43pm
  - Dudley Quaffquaff
    
    And what exactly is your personal experience with immigration advisers?
    
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    April 30, 2025 1:16pm
- Jack5
  
  Meanwhile New Zealand Chinese vegetable growers fight to keep their industry viable.
  
  Ethnic-Chinese — industrious, law-abiding citizens — endured decades of discrimination, and endured it stoically.
  
  While today’s smugglers bring in cheap labour from Asia, NZ’s old ethnic Chinese came to set up businesses. The ones who came to mine gold wanted to return to China, either wealthy, or in coffins.
  
  A surge of regulations, some of them ultra-Green, now threatens the market-garden industry, and the gardeners warn this could push up vegetable prices alarmingly.
  
  The vegetable industry is taken for granted. Even Don Brash naively suggested fine horticulture land near Auckland should be turned into more housing.
  
  (“The Don” overlooked that only about 37 per cent of NZ’s “plenty of land” is agricultural, and of that the proportion suitable for vegetable farming is much less, and that economic vegetable land needs to be near big markets).
  
  As developers shepherd New Zealanders into garden-less apartments, the country threatens to push vegetable prices to the sky.
  
  To be fair: plant pandemics are sweeping an over-populated, border-challenged world, and reaction of scientists and bureaucrats is understandable. But we need to know the cost (second link below) and how to minimise it.
  
  https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/pukekohes-fong-family-marks-75-years-of-vegetable-growing-calls-for-govt-support-for-sector/QBIOVHQ6LBBGBIEALDHTUKYQTA/
  
  Plant pandemics:
  
  https://www.downtoearth.org.in/agriculture/plant-pandemics-they-could-be-hastened-due-to-deadly-and-global-pathogenic-spread
  
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  April 30, 2025 12:06pm
NeverMindTheBollocks

The replacement Manawatu Gorge highway will soon open, which is great. Not so great is that it passes through Woodville. SH2 could easily and should be routed to the north of town, resulting in further time savings for travellers.

Apparently, the route decision was swayed by Woodville residents, who feared being bypassed. They should have listened to the likes of Otaki SH1 and Paekakariki, which are booming as quiet destination villages, just off the motorway.

A dumb decision. Highways are primarily about safe and speedy travel.

http://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/559374/new-manawatu-tararua-highway-to-open-in-june-transport-minister-chris-bishop-confirms

http://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360668288/bypassed-small-towns-transformation-after-major-highway-reroute
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April 30, 2025 8:01am
- Jack5
  
  Add to the Otaki and Paekakariki cases, the thriving town of Kaiapoi, just off the main north highway from Christchurch.
  
  Rangiora is thriving, too, though it’s further than “just off” the same highway.
  
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  April 30, 2025 1:41pm
Tomtoddy

The latest killing in Sweden involved three people shot in a barbershop. It is part of a rapidly deteriorating situation where, in places like Uppsala, crime is out of control. Forty-seven people have been killed in 314 shootings so far this year, police said, compared to only seven deaths in 2016.

Police last year investigated 336 15- to 17-year-olds for having illegal firearms, eight times more than a decade ago, according to their National Council for Crime Prevention.

Prime Minister Kristersson has blamed the rise in organised crime on “naivety” over immigration. “An irresponsible immigration policy and failed integration led us here,” the conservative leader said. And we know where most of these immigrants came from and their ideology.

“Mass Islamic immigration has turned Sweden, once one of the safest countries in the world, into one of the most dangerous in Europe within two generations,” said Amy Mek of the US-based think tank Rair Foundation.
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April 30, 2025 8:04am
- Raphael
  
  A 15-year-old Swedish lad has just been arrested in Australia for running an “Assassins R Us” website to do contract killings in Sweden.
  
  https://notthebee.com/article/a-15-year-old-in-australia-was-arrested-and-charged-with-organizing-assassinations-in-sweden/
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:57am
- Stellaboxer
  
  It wasn’t as if they weren’t warned. The tragedy if that none of the leftists that caused this will be held to any meaningful account whilst their bedfellows across the west carry on with the same policy as if nothing has happened.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:58am
- David Garrett
  
  Tom: A friend in Tonga – a Swedish-Croatian-Tongan if you can believe that – has told me the Muslim population of Sweden now exceeds 20% – and the stupid bastards are apparently still letting more of them in.
  
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  April 30, 2025 12:12pm
  - fernglas
    
    “As of 2025, the total population of Muslims in Sweden is at around 1,000,000 people, 10% of Swedens population.”
    -Wikipedia
    
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    April 30, 2025 3:59pm
    - nz_aj
      
      Every fourth (24.9%) resident in the country has a foreign background and every third (32.3%) has at least one parent born abroad.
      -Wikipedia
      
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      April 30, 2025 9:05pm
- kiwimike
  
  so are the Swedes getting what they deserved?
  It is not as if they weren’t warned over many years ?
  
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  May 1, 2025 4:01am
Cassandra

If any country should be the poster-boy for Net Zero surely it should be wet, windy, sunny, empty (of people) New Zealand. But it’s not, for the very good reason that, after years of hope, the goal of renewable energy still eludes us. Wind don’t blow and sun don’t shine, at least not enough to solve the problem, and battery technology is still too primitive. And what do we do with the has-been solar panels and batteries? An enlightened government would fess up and tell its people the truth – Net Zero is a myth and a con. It might also admit that the whole global warming shebang is a myth and a con, an unproven theory which has been manipulated and falsified, and even if that was not the case there’s SFA anyone can do about it. So let’s explore amelioration and stop shooting ourselves in both feet!
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April 30, 2025 8:04am
- Frank the tank
  
  Just listen to Billy Bob Thornton’s line in Landman when dealing with a young, liberal white woman lawyer. It sums up the net zero nonsense succinctly.
  
  Both establishment parties in NZ lack the moral conviction to lay out the cold, hard truth even though deep down they all know it, Even Hipkins and our PM.
  
  I find it amusing that the main reason not to drop this nonsense is recently signed trade agreements that should have nothing to do with climate change.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:11am
  - pdm
    
    ESPECIALLY Hipkins and our PM.
    
    Fixed it for you Frank.
    
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    April 30, 2025 8:31am
  - Allan
    
    The original clip is not available because of copyright but there are plenty of rebutttal videos.
    
    As best I can tell they all pooh-pooh the claims by using best possible scenario’s and plenty of ifs and buts.
    
    I think the folks on the Iberian peninsula have got the reality of alternate energy good and hard.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:51am
- Grumpy Silver Top
  
  I completely agree Cassandra. Yes, we are experiencing climate change. We can do SFA about it. Our host planet is following its own path. Let’s proactively develop adaptation processes and agencies and spend the money wisely. No more good money after bad.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:13am
  - Local Miller
    
    No, we are NOT experiencing climate change. The raw evidence is that Hurricanes/Tropical Storms/Cyclones are not increasing in either frequency or intensity. There has been no change in the rainfall patterns across the globe. While one area gets less rain for a while another gets more and this changes over time, but there is no pattern of change. There is also no change in the Arctic or Antarctic ice cover.
    If anything based on the USA temperature data (this is the best in the world and goes back consistently the furthest), temperatures are actually dropping!
    
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    April 30, 2025 12:10pm
- Tom Hunter
  
  Meantime the cretin known as “Idiot Savant” is boasting about how in New Zealand, new solar farms are being built and Gas is dead
  
  A substantial part of his group really will be quite happy if we turn into a cold Cuba.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:24am
  - Mike
    
    The US isn’t going to impose crippling sanctions on NZ, is it?
    
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    April 30, 2025 8:26am
  - Im Right
    
    @Tom…Idiot Savant used to be good, and insightful….before he drank the Kool aid at the socialist stall.
    He doesn’t even have comments enabled now, as most people were telling him the hard truths of his posts.
    1st rule of anyone who has drunk the same Kool aid, contrary viewpoints are not allowed, debate not allowed….
    He is just a fringe far left poster now, and an angry one too it seems, which fits in nicely to where he is currently at and heading.
    
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    April 30, 2025 8:36am
    - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
      
      Didnt even know he was still going, used to read him back in the Kiwi Pundit days. Never agreed with him, but he could argue with logic on occasion.
      
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      April 30, 2025 10:18am
  - rouppe
    
    I always wonder how they come up with statements like “produces enough power for a town the size of Ashburton.”
    
    It can’t power the town, because it doesn’t work at night and is compromised in cloudy weather. No one ever asks this
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:00am
    - cmm
      
      They do this by looking at the nameplate capacity and comparing this to the average load.
      
      That means when the sun is shining at the perfect angle, with perfect temperature etc, then it could provide the average power for Ashburton or whatever.
      
      Unfortunately the average output is a small fraction of the nameplate capacity. Over a year you’re lucky to get 15%.
      
      Even when they do quote averages there is still a mismatch between supply and demand.
      
      The one thing we have going for us in NZ is that most of our renewables are in the form of hydro which is predictable and controllable.
      
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      April 30, 2025 9:37am
      - rouppe
        
        That advantage is at serious risk of reducing simply due to the age of some of that plant. And you can’t consent new hydro with all the people wanting their narrows pushed, be it brown skinks or a payout
        
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        April 30, 2025 10:30am
      - Jack5
        
        CMM’s …most of our renewables are in the form of hydro …
        
        Don’t forget about geothermal generation. Seems to be supplying about 20 per cent of our power. In Iceland it provides about two-thirds of power.
        
        Plenty about it and the potential here:
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_power_in_New_Zealand
        
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        April 30, 2025 1:54pm
      - CJames
        
        Here is the generation out of Lauriston – very erratic not only day to day but minute to minute
        https://electricitymap.frenchsta.gg/?timeframe=-3d&site=LAU&fuel=SOL%2CDIE
        Did you know then Germans (who have a lot of experience in these problems) have a new term for the opposite of dunkelflaute – Hellbrise. It is when they have so much wind and solar they have negative pricing or have to constrain stations off. Even got its own Wikipedia entry
        
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        April 30, 2025 4:50pm
      - CJames
        
        Jack5
        Iceland is about one third geothermal and two thirds hydro.
        There isn’t much more potential in NZ not if you are looking for something say Clyde sized. NZ next year should be about 10TWh
        
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        April 30, 2025 4:56pm
  - Taieri
    
    Meantime the cretin known as “Idiot Savant”
    ———
    
    “Idiot Savant” or just an Idiot?
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:11am
- redeye
  
  Spain and Portugal got to try net-zero yesterday and they apparently weren’t happy with it.
  
  from a peter sweden tweet🙂
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:36am
  - keepcalmcarryon
    
    Net zero electricity.
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:51am
  - peterwn
    
    Interestingly the old New Zealand Electricity Department people (the ones despised in Rogernomics and by the likes of Rodrick Deane and John Fernyhough) appreciated the possibility of a Spanish type situation in the North Island way back in the late 1960’s. The solution was to install control equipment in its North Island substations That would drop two blocks of 20% load (40% in all) if the system frequency fell below about 47Hz (usually 50Hz) for a second or so (I cannot remember exact figures). So if there was a major failure (especially with the Cook Strait cable equipment) the load would be cut to what remaining generation could handle and the Grid would not fall flat on its face. It is far easier and quicker to sort out a diminished and running Grid than if the whole lot has fallen over, Thermal power stations like New Plymouth (when running) and Huntly take hours to get going if they shut down because the Grid has dropped out.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:10am
    - CJames
      
      That load shedding AUFSL capability is still there and significantly better than NZE days. It intitates at a higher frequency and there are 4 blocks. There is even a video explaining it.
      https://www.transpower.co.nz/system-operator/information-industry/asset-owner-requirements/automatic-under-frequency-load
      At 47Hz all the thermals disconnect though South Island and its hydros can go to 45Hz. H
      
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      April 30, 2025 5:02pm
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    Yes, you would have thought the people trapped on trains and in elevators would be celebrating their achievements in fighting the climate emergency!
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:19am
- [email protected]
  
  New Zealand enjoys a huge amount of clean hydro that any country would be envious of.
  
  Last I saw, some 80% of our electrical power is already clean renewable power.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:37am
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    Yes, but hydro and geothermal are good for baseload, because they are pretty reliable (as long as the lakes are kept high. Turns out Muldoon and Birch were right, and abundant cheap energy opened up options right across the economy.
    
    Wind, solar, and batteries are by definition not reliable solutions. So of course we will go there.
    
    Now note the 1.2m tonnes of coal we have imported for Huntly.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:21am
    - Clyde
      
      Hydro is by far the most efficient producer of energy we have and is part of baseload. It also has the ability to be able to be on or off grid very quickly. BUT the ability to be able to build more is completely fucked by the RMA and the absolute racial stupidity of some East Polynesians who are extracting millions from companies like Meridian to not object to existing consents to continue to operate the Waitaki system. FFS. The $168m paid out to the trough ends directly on your power bill. Why do we put up with this crap?
      
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      April 30, 2025 12:25pm
      - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
        
        Indeed. Fucking scandal meridien simply rolled over when blackmailed. Sod the consumers
        
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        April 30, 2025 3:28pm
  - R
    
    We would have had 100 % clean sustainable power if it hadn’t been for greenie activists and ignorant academics using a compliant msm to generate public disquiet about building more hydro during the 1970’s/80’s era. With the possible exception of the Waikato river sources the power generated would have been very clean.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:14am
- Chuck Bird
  
  I believe the solar panels are made using slave labour.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:37am
  - Mike
    
    Like many peoducts you buy without a second thought.
    
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    April 30, 2025 8:49am
    - RichardF
      
      I don’t think I’m saving the planet when I buy new shoes.
      
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      April 30, 2025 9:57am
      - Mike
        
        Interestingly, Kiwibloggers only seem to show any concern for human rights when it appears that slave labor or child labor is being exploited to produce ‘green’ products. I’d wager Chuck doesn’t give two hoots if his coffee beans or cotton clothes are produced by slaves.
        
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        April 30, 2025 10:34am
      - BananaLlama
        
        Mike you are a Kiwiblogger, you post here the same as everyone else.
        
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        April 30, 2025 11:55am
    - AitchW
      
      So may we assume Mike that you check the origin of every item you buy to make sure that there is no slave labour used in the manufacture of that item?
      
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      April 30, 2025 11:04am
      - Swifty
        
        Maori have extensive experience with the correct management of slaves – we should ask them what is appropriate.
        
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        April 30, 2025 11:49am
      - David Garrett
        
        Tom H: Well, he is quite right in his conclusion that “gas is dead”. It was dealt a mortal blow by a silly little girl’s “captain’s call”, and it will never recover from that.
        
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        April 30, 2025 12:33pm
      - David Garrett
        
        Aitch: Of course he doesn’t check…he has openly stated that his only reason for being here is to troll and annoy the rest of us.
        
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        April 30, 2025 12:35pm
      - Fender
        
        Why do you constantly refer to kiwibloggers as the opposition or critical from a superior posture even though you read and post constantly
        You have to be being paid surely , no one has the patience to read daily from people they disagree with yet you do
        Please explain
        
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        April 30, 2025 12:53pm
      - Mike
        
        Fender
        For my amusement mainly, although friends are also amused by some of the nonsense spouted here daily.
        
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        April 30, 2025 2:58pm
      - Pineapple Lumps
        
        [Mod – debate the topics and leave the personal rubbish out of it]
        
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        April 30, 2025 9:05pm
  - imalwaysright
    
    We’re all slaves to some degree Chuck.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:45am
  - [email protected]
    
    I believe that you are right. My quick search shows that 90% of solar panels are manufactured in China and that significant amounts of slave labour is used to manufacture them. I would be happy to be proven wrong.
    
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    April 30, 2025 7:27pm
- RoboRob
  
  Genesis opens New Zealand’s largest solar farm in Canterbury
  
  https://www.genesisenergy.co.nz/about/generation/lauriston-solar-farm
  
  Why? This ‘farm’ takes 93 hectares of farm land near Ashburton to produce ‘supposedly’ 63MW of electricity. I can guarantee you that figure is rarely, if every hit. For example today, cold, DARK and wet. Couldn’t find actual output figures but Wiki claims it is a 47MW output farm!
  
  Regardless, why? Canterbury has wind, it isn’t known for its solar hours (that would be Nelson and Blenheim). During the winter most days are dull and overcast, just when you want the power. So we have wasted 93h of farm land and spent $100m on something that is going to generate very little power and mainly at times the country doesn’t need it.
  
  I see Spark has a contract to ‘take’ all the power generated for the next 5 years. Great virtue signalling. However If I recall how the power grid works customers don’t get to chose where their electrons are generated. Contracts for power, like Microsoft has for some data centers, are only ‘real’ when the generation is located beside the facility (nuclear in the US for example). I dont think spark has all their data centers or offices in Lauriston.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:12am
  - cmm
    
    Spark’s offer would be more meaningful if they also took the unreliability of solar too.
    But they will still want the filthy stuff when the sun isn’t shining.
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:40am
  - the deity formerly known as nigel6888
    
    But feel the shield of sanctimony! Doesn’t that feel good now.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:23am
  - MCōs
    
    Solar panels still work on cloudy days.
    Sheep keep the grass down and the panels provide shade
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:47am
    - RoboRob
      
      I have solar hot water at home and while it works on cloudy days the output is massively reduced. I understand the same is true for solar. A quick web search shows that the output is somewhere between 10% and 25%
      
      In Christchurch (1hr north of the farm) it is currently raining and heavily clouded. Whilst not ‘dark’, I am seeing cars driving with their lights on. I would be stunned if they were even generating 10%.
      
      Indeed checking https://www.transpower.co.nz/system-operator/live-system-and-market-data/consolidated-live-data shows the ENTIRE COUNTRIES solar generation to be 29MW at the moment! I think point proven 🙂
      
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      April 30, 2025 11:35am
      - [email protected]
        
        Our solar system still outputs a significant amount of power (40 – 60%) when clouds are around. Don’t know for sure but maybe the UV light still gets through the clouds. It is definitely rain that actually kills our solar output.
        
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        April 30, 2025 7:34pm
    - Taieri
      
      Sheep keep the grass down and the panels provide shade
      ————-
      
      And grass grows really well under the panels…
      
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      April 30, 2025 1:48pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    Producing something around 20% of peak or 10MW averaged over all hours of year. Perhaps 80-100000MWh a year, with market value near $10 million. From an investment of $104million.
    
    Looks to be ball-park economic. Depends a lot on summer value of electricity.
    https://www.interest.co.nz/charts/commodities/wholesale-electricity
    
    There is a lot of peak summer demand for electricity from farm irrigation in canterbury. So could be well matched to local demand peaks.
    
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    April 30, 2025 4:27pm
  - CJames
    
    I gave the link to Lauriston’s generation upthread
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:03pm
lifesgood

Pleased to see the government reverse the voting rights for criminals. They should never have been given them but what else could you expect from air head Jacinda? If you rape, murder or commit other unspeakable crimes you lose all your rights, period
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April 30, 2025 8:08am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Sadly, not applying to the next election. Paul Goldsmith should have the courage of his convictions and apply the prohibition from the day the Bill is enacted.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:45am
- Ian Boag
  
  To get voting rights, the sentence had to be three years or under. Pretty much excludes rapists and murderers and “other unspeakable crimes” …
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:01am
  - Ghost
    
    I’m reminded of the 18 year old rapists that both got home detention
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:14am
  - Mike
    
    Was it actual sentence length or crimes punishable by more than 3 years’ imprisonment?
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:36am
- Simon
  
  Voting rights for criminals Team national Labo in fighting for the cattle.
  
  Prisons are a moral and fiscal failure- Bill English & Jacinda Ardern.
  
  Get the prison population up to 20k to remove crime culture from NZ, National would have a break down.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:07am
  - Allan
    
    Bill and Jacinda have different contexts for their claim.
    
    Bill would address the root causes.
    
    Jacinda would just throw lots more of your money into the botttomless pit of wellfare and tell you to be kind.
    
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    April 30, 2025 12:00pm
- MCōs
  
  If you’re in prison for rape, murder or other unspeakable crimes and have a sentence longer than three years you’ve never been able to vote.
  On the other hand if you’re on remand for rape, murder or committing other unspeakable crimes or any other crime or home detention the ban won’t apply and that accounts for about 40% of prisoners.
  https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/prisoner-voting-ban-to-be-brought-back-paul-goldmsith/2VDXLUSECJE2VHCSFUYNEMTECA/
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:43am
- AitchW
  
  Given that most first time inmates have already been convicted of somewhere in the region of 30 criminal offences these folks locked up for “minor” crimes are not decent law abiding citizens who made a silly mistake.
  A child sex offender was recently sentenced in the Hamilton District Court to 28 months for a slew of historical offences. And they were only the ones reported!
  Go to jail, lose your vote. REALLY simple.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:07am
- gravedodger
  
  I hear you but there will be a separation of Wairarapa and Hawkes Bay traffic so having the junction remain at Woodville makes some minor sense to me.
  Now for Dannevirke a bypass there would be a go.
  Lived in Wairarapa for two decades at end of last century, having no bypass for Carterton, Greytown Featherston plus the Michael Mouse one for Masterton were definitely blights on the arse of humanity. The Masterton bypass is so poorly designed I would always drive through the metro area with my middle finger raised.
  Any commercial entity needing traffic directed to the door is rarely worth consideration.
  
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  April 30, 2025 1:23pm
Tomtoddy

Victory for the MSM in Canada.
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April 30, 2025 8:20am
- Mike
  
  Defeat for Trump.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:26am
  - Cassandra
    
    Absolutely. Canadians have reacted to Trump. I feel sorry for Poilievre who, just a few months ago, was riding high. But I wonder if there might be buyers’ remorse coming – Carney is not a politician. Canada still has to face reality.
    
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    April 30, 2025 8:54am
    - Simon
      
      “Canadians have reacted to Trump.” Wrong. Boomers reacted to Trump
      
      Doesn’t matter both main parties are equal rubbish. Not too unlike NZ
      
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      April 30, 2025 9:09am
    - RoboRob
      
      Sure trump has had an impact, probably a big impact, but Poilievres initial numbers were exaggerated due to Trudeaus massive unpopularity. Once Trudeau went a number of disatisfied Lefty voters were likely to come back (regardless of Trump).
      
      The Canadians generally seem very ‘progressive’ from what I can see. The seem to love their government monopolies and heavy regulation. They also seem very woke. Never been, just my impression.
      
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      April 30, 2025 9:25am
      - Cassandra
        
        You’re right to a degree. Alberta etc not woke but Ontario and the coasts are. I am of Canadian descent. Mixed race, one grandmother was an Aussie. Looks like Oz will stay left too. Darn!!
        
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        April 30, 2025 10:51am
      - Ian Boag
        
        They seem to love their government monopolies ,,,
        
        They have a pretty reasonable public health system too.
        
        9 4
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        April 30, 2025 1:43pm
    - Conservatarian
      
      Every proper country needs a gay socialist country to their north.
      
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      April 30, 2025 9:30am
  - Frank the tank
    
    You realize Trump supported Carney in the election right. Canada are like Turkeys voting for an early Christmas.
    
    Looking forward to a WEF-globalist trying to fight Trump on tariffs. China can push back on tariffs, Canada not so much.
    
    Within 6 months most west of Ottawa will have buyers regret.
    
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    April 30, 2025 12:28pm
  - Plumbs
    
    Heh heh,,,
    
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    April 30, 2025 6:33pm
- colina
  
  I hope Trump is pleased with the result after his ongoing rants about them becoming the 51st state.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:26am
  - kowtow
    
    The Trump factor is way overstated .
    
    The resounding results in two conservative provinces prove that beyond doubt.
    
    Meanwhile how much of a “victory” was it for Climate Carney when the Conservatives actually increased their seats and the vote was actually relatively close .
    
    The bigger story is of course the virtual wipe out of the more leftist votes for the NDP and Greens which migrated presumably to Carnage Carney as they voted strategically to keep the conservatives out.
    
    Will the Trump Blue Suiters even mention those factors ?
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:22am
    - Plumbs
      
      [Mod – debate without abuse]the libs have been in fo 9 years.Yee hah, [deleted]
      
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      April 30, 2025 6:36pm
  - Fender
    
    You have to wonder if that was his plan
    Why would you want your neighbours to have strength when you are dealing with them
    Much easier to manipulate I would have thought and perhaps played a long game as others suggest
    Driving them slowly to want to join the usa but letting them vote their way for it
    Divide and conquer and all that
    
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    April 30, 2025 3:35pm
- James Stephenson
  
  Oh Canada…what have you done.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:46am
  - Northshoredoc
    
    Completed a free and fair election by the looks of things.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:10am
    - imalwaysright
      
      I don’t think it was free and fair.
      The political parties are restricted by electioneering regulations, but the media aren’t to the same extent.
      Apparently the state funds Canadian media at over $1 billion pa.
      That buys a lot of favourable coverage for Carney.
      CCCP = Carney’s Canadian Carnage Party.
      
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      April 30, 2025 12:46pm
- Dudley Quaffquaff
  
  Cometh the hour, cometh the man. A level-headed expert economist is exactly what Canada and even the world needs at this point. Poilievre’s time will come, but it’s not now
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:19am
  - Northshoredoc
    
    It will be fascinating to see how Canada’s trade mix changes over the next five years if at all.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:12am
    - artemisia
      
      As I understand it trade between US and Canada is similar $ each way, 2 or 3 $bill a day total. If goods and services become more expensive, makes sense for demand to reduce. Or for it to become more economic to produce internally. 25% tariff would make that more likely, 10% (fuel) less so.
      
      The population of Canada is a fraction of that of the USA, so a reduction in demand from the USA will have a much greater impact than vv. Have I got that right?
      
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      April 30, 2025 1:23pm
  - kowtow
    
    No one as committed to climate catastrophism as Carney can be labelled “level headed” .
    
    There is plenty of commentary in the Canadian conservative ,level headed, media about what an absolute fraud this man is ,but of course we’ll see none of that.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:19am
    - Dudley Quaffquaff
      
      How do you make him out to be committed to climate catastrophism? He’s already ditched Trudeau’s carbon tax on consumers.
      
      5 6
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      April 30, 2025 1:19pm
      - kowtow
        
        DQ
        
        Unlike some I read . Also research for yourself is not difficult in the interent era.
        Yes he dropped one very unpopular Trudeau policy but that’s simple good politics , while seeking election.
        
        Anyway watch him , these Davos Types will continue with net zero pollicies in one disguise or other.
        
        “You have said that the goal of net zero is the greatest commercial opportunity of our time. Why?
        
        Climate change is an existential threat. We all recognize that, and there’s increasing urgency around it. But the converse is, if you are making investments, coming up with new technologies, changing the way you do business, all in service of reducing and eliminating that threat, you are creating value. And what we have seen increasingly, spurred initially by the Sustainable Development Goals, accelerated by Paris, and then by social movements and governments, is societies putting tremendous value on achieving net zero. Companies, and those who invest in them and lend to them, and who are part of the solution, will be rewarded. Those who are lagging behind and are still part of the problem will be punished.”
        
        https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/mark-carney-investing-net-zero-climate-solutions-creates-value-and-rewards
        
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        April 30, 2025 2:40pm
  - Jethrod
    
    And in the meantime the magical Liberal party has come through, salvaging victory from the pits of HELL. The magic sprinkling of fairy dust will continue with virtually no changes and the serfs will only realize this in 6 to 9 months, when there will be much ranting and the tearing of hair saying “what have we done”!
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:07am
  - Frank the tank
    
    Should read WEF-globalist/socialist. Carney was right in bed with CovidCult as well in his previous role.
    
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    April 30, 2025 12:30pm
- Dougal10
  
  The incumbent won with what is now a minority govt , this to me is quite a change in the right direction for a very socialist country.
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:44am
  - Ian Boag
    
    Minority governments are not a new thing in Canada. When I lived there (as a grad student) in the 70’s the first election I got to watch led to a Lib minority gov. I was a bit surprised and asked my Canadian mates what happened now. Coalition maybe? I was told that minority govs were not a new idea and they often worked out quite well.
    
    Go figure ….
    
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    April 30, 2025 7:12pm
- Handyman
  
  Canadians are leftists. Thay can afford virtue signaling on the back of Alberta gas and oil.
  A Trump master troll would be to declare he does not want all of Canada, just Alberta. It would make Canada net carbon zero overnight. It would also make them unable to afford any of their social policies. Hypocrites!
  To add a bit of fun he could impose a highway tax to drive through Alberta to get from one side of Canda to the other.
  
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  April 30, 2025 4:11pm
Maggy Wassilieff

It seems first year students at Auckland University are not impressed by the quality/content of their compulsory paper in ToW/maoritanga.

“the content is vague, poorly structured, and disconnected from the degrees they are enrolled in… It is oversimplified, politically one-sided, and lacking academic depth.”
;
I haven’t learned shit so far and we’ve done almost six weeks of it. Waste of time, waste of money, waste of resources. Never should have been created in the first place.”

https://pointofordernz.wordpress.com/2025/04/29/auckland-uni-students-react-to-treaty-indoctrination/
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April 30, 2025 8:31am
- nova
  
  Not surprising. And I expect it to also have a significant impact on alumni donations. As an alumnus I don’t intend to make another donation for a very long time, directly because of the way this course was imposed.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:53am
  - Gussy Fink-Nottle
    
    It may have some impact on foreign student enrolments and, most probably, international rankings too.
    Reduction in critical thinking skills and quality of academic staff is a given.
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:28am
  - pdm
    
    nova I hope you have told the University hierarchy that.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:14am
    - Paulus
      
      The University is immersed in Maori anything they want us to believe, and accept.
      As if they would take any notice of what anybody else would think or say !
      Sadly it is getting worse very quickly.
      
      7 1
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      April 30, 2025 5:29pm
- Simon
  
  All under a National led government. Shame National you are hot garbage
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:11am
  - RoboRob
    
    Does National have the power to determine what courses the university provides? Surely the market will determine that. If the universities roll drops that will be a sign their course mix is not right. Assuming they are smart enough to connect the dots.
    
    I guess National could cut paas a bill preventing universities from having compulsory papers for all degrees but I would then expert universities to have the same paper renamed for each course. The could refuse funding for cultural papers, but that seems unreasonable as studing culture has been part of universities forever.
    
    People need to vote with their feet. You can see this with people fleeing Vic and Otago (dropping rolls) and Canterbury having a growing roll. Not saying Canterbury is perfect, my eldest is currently doing his compulsory Maori course (its not called that but its what it is).
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:33am
    - leoj
      
      National has the power to state their opposition to such nonsense but are too cowardly.
      
      17 1
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      April 30, 2025 10:21am
      - pdm
        
        ACT has and is taking some action.
        
        I think Parmjeet Parmar has a bill in the draw from the biscuit tin.
        
        Perhaps National are blocking it from being a Government Bill.
        
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        April 30, 2025 11:39am
    - Michael Sommerville
      
      The market cannot control it as it is a compulsory course. Make it optional and the market will tell them.
      
      Their virtue signalling won’t let that happen.
      
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      April 30, 2025 1:17pm
      - Miritu
        
        The market could easily solve this: Leave universities to self fund from fees etc. No govt subsidies, no interest free loans (ideally no govt loans at all), allow full competition from other education providers, no special status for universities.
        
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        April 30, 2025 6:21pm
      - Ian Boag
        
        Yo Miritu.
        
        The market could easily solve this: Leave universities to self fund from fees etc
        
        Why just unis? Why not everything from ECE through to prinary/high schools and polytechs?
        
        Consistency …. 🙂
        
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        April 30, 2025 7:15pm
    - Pope Punctilious II
      
      I doubt “the market” will solve this one. I won’t be a bit surprised if other universities follow suit in imposing a compulsory “white man bad” paper on all students, as the VC’s have striven to out-woke each other in other respects. And despite some student pushback, I suspect the majority will just go with the flow – after all, the media constantly bombards us with stories about “inequidy”, about how racist NZ is, and how maatauranga is supposedly helping us fight climate change etc. If people are told crap like that often enough, they believe at least some of it.
      
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      April 30, 2025 1:51pm
- imalwaysright
  
  I’m surprised that the students expected a course with any substance.
  The entire point of the “course” is the fees.
  The activists came up with the idea of having a course as a cover for the extortion because extortion is still, I think, illegal in NZ.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:17am
  - RoboRob
    
    The paper should be (boring but) easy points. I would expect the usual, regurgitate back what the lecturer believes and get an easy pass.
    
    The issue is the opportunity cost, they could have been learning something related to their degree. One of 24 papers wasted, essentially making a 23 paper degree.
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:37am
- Swifty
  
  Good grief, the left aren’t even embarrassed by their biases anymore nor do they try to hide them.
  
  And worse, they bitterly resent and have little tantrums when called out on using taxpayer money to further their political objectives.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:17am
- Scooter
  
  I don’t know why they don’t protest, after all isn’t that what Uni’s are all about. Or are they now just conformists?
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:53am
  - NothingLeft
    
    Ooh yes lets all paint big targets on our backs to draw the ire of the most unhinged, vindictive, bigoted, racist, misandric and sadly powerful block within the governance of the university, who might find ways and means to fuck up your academic record.
    
    Or, you know, just keep your head down and get out of the shit-show as soon as possible with the best marks you can get to open doors on better job opportunities.
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:39pm
    - Pope Punctilious II
      
      Sadly, you are on the money here.
      
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      April 30, 2025 8:34pm
- Philview
  
  I am sure the other Universities will soon introduce it. There will certainly be no critical analysis allowed in that expensive paper. All the more reason for your child to do a Trade. No doubt it will be tagged onto apprenticeships in the future as well. The reason Labour centralised polytechnics was really about controlling the messaging into the heads of students.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:14am
- rouppe
  
  In fact, when Eru Kapa-Kingi — a vice-president of Te Pāti Māori who develops and teaches courses for Law School — was interviewed for an Auckland University newsletter in March, he said: “We need to start realising that universities were one of the primary tools of colonisation in Aotearoa, replacing Māori philosophy, Māori ways of thinking, speaking and acting.
  
  No one is forced to go to university. If you think that university is a tool of colonisation, you shouldn’t be interested in law, engineering, dentistry or IT, because those follow on from colonisation.
  
  You can’t have it both ways.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:44am
- David Garrett
  
  Maggy: Much to my delight, my daughter has started studying law this year. She has to do this compulsory Maori indoctrination paper.
  
  I am very pleased to know that without any comment or urging from me, she has come to exactly the same conclusions as reported in your comment above. Rather to my surprise, she says that if not a majority, a substantial proportion of her fellow students think exactly the same way – although she says many of them are cagey about admitting it.
  
  My advice to her has been to just regurgitate what the examiners clearly want to hear in assignments or exams, and get on with the “real stuff” next year.
  
  Incidentally, my daughter identifies as “half Tongan” rather than “half palangi”, which has always upset me a bit.
  
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  April 30, 2025 12:45pm
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    It seems the folks at Auckland Uni who have devised this compulsory money-making scambo are unaware that most NZ school pupils have been exposed to years of teaching about ToW, maori myths, matauranga, tikanga, etc and aren’t really desperate for more of the same.
    
    If students wanted to know more about ToW, NZ History or Te Reo, then they would have opted for these topics in their course of study.
    
    It might be a hard concept for some ToW activitists and NZ history buffs to comprehend, but being subjected to ear bashing on topics you’re not interested in is very BORING!
    
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    April 30, 2025 1:51pm
    - NothingLeft
      
      Probably not much different from what it used to be like in pre-20th century academia with regard to compulsory harping on about Christian theology.
      
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      April 30, 2025 5:41pm
Chuck Bird

Sex is biological, but women and men mustn’t be defined as such, says the RANZCP.

https://aboldwoman.substack.com/p/sex-is-biological-but-women-and-men?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1177996&post_id=162482496&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1p69qr&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
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April 30, 2025 8:33am
- slightlyrighty
  
  Can someone who is an expert in these matters explain how, given the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists have now weighed in on this matter of gender identification, this is no longer regarded as a mental health issue?
  
  This notion of being “Born in the wrong body” does not pass the logic test, as the “Body” is incapable of being wrong or right. It simply is what it is.
  
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  April 30, 2025 8:58am
  - lifesgood
    
    You are right, the body is incapable of being right or wrong, it is what it is. On the other hand the brain can be screwed, Psychiatrists should jolly well know that. It’s high time this gender nonsense is seen for what it is, a mental disorder.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:54am
NeverMindTheBollocks

Tory Whanau is being held up as a role model for recovering alcoholics and ADHD sufferers. See how she can hold down an important job!

However, I see that she will miss the important Council meeting that will set the Long Term Plan as she is taking an overseas holiday at that time.

Just another bad decision in a long line of them.

Tory is praised by the Left for what she is. The rest of us judge her on what she does.
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April 30, 2025 8:41am
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  And the dirty deal with Little and Labour will see Whaa as May as dep mayor I bet
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:31am
  - PurplePen
    
    I can’t believe that Little could see that as useful to his campaign considering Whanau’s reputation. He’ll have to announce she’s his running mate so-to-speak.
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:40pm
- imalwaysright
  
  I would say there is very little chance of her showing up for work again before the election.
  She has already checked out…
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:04am
- PurplePen
  
  Recall the very recent outrage when councillor Chung left just one meeting early for personal business. No outrage here though when the mayor skives off from entire meetings.
  
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  April 30, 2025 5:38pm
RoboRob

The Herald political editor on NewsTalk said he thought that people would look back on Whanaus mayoralty and realise that she wasn’t as bad as portayed.

Lol, I assume this guy lives in Wellington and is drinking heavily on the lefty coolaid. That someone who is supposed to follow news and politics could think something so stupid is beyond belief. Having mental health issues, honesty issues, drug addiction and a permanent habit of not showing up for meetings are hardly personalty traits of a good Mayor, let alone her actual record of accomplishments.

No wonder people have lost face in the MSM, if someone can think they can mislead you about something so obviously wrong what about stuff that isn’t so easily checked?

p.s. just checked and yes he is based in Wellington and used to work for Stuff and Newsroom.
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April 30, 2025 8:51am
- mandk
  
  ” … based in Wellington and used to work for Stuff and Newsroom.”
  
  So, he has impeccable lefty credentials.
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:30am
- rouppe
  
  Perhaps it’s a prediction.
  
  Maybe when we look back after a theoretical Andrew Little mayoralty we WILL think she wasn’t as bad as him.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:31am
  - Eastlander
    
    Justin Lester sounded out the possibility of a comeback and was jeered back into the shadows. Nothing is ever going to rehabilitate Whanau.
    
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    April 30, 2025 12:18pm
Sparrow

Next to the PM the most important position is the Minister of Finance. Our last unlamented Minister was generally considered as being incompetent and not qualified for such an important position. So what do we have now a highly qualified financial wizard, sadly no.
The present Minister has a degree in English Lit and a diploma in journalism, was a lobbyist government advisor, worked for a short period for the corporate giant Frontera. Never even run a corner dairy. From a very privileged background, just part of the 4% mentioned by Alwyn Poole. Has never won an electorate. It would seem totally immersed in the Wellington environment. This is not a rant of envy but a serious question as to why the New Zealand political system keeps selecting totally unqualified people from both sides of politics to hold this important position who frankly have no idea what makes most kiwis desire and most importantly understand their portfolio and get lead by the nose by their officials or party ideology.
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April 30, 2025 8:58am
- Mike
  
  She always seems to me to be trying to model herself on Ruth Richardson.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:38am
  - RoboRob
    
    If only 🙂
    
    30 1
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    April 30, 2025 9:50am
  - RichardF
    
    She’s not as smart as Ruth Richsrdson, though. Although, to be fair, Richardson was a trained lawyer who worked at the Department of Justice for a while before entering politics. She also didn’t have a finance or business background but imo she was a much stronger and decisive finance minister than Willis.
    
    I am not very impressed by Willis who talks in clichés and sound bites.
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:05am
    - G the giant from Dunedin
      
      Well, Richardson did not have 2 other parties in coalition creating road blocks over cutting spending
      
      5 9
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      April 30, 2025 10:36am
      - pdm
        
        Make that one party G.
        
        ACT want more cuts and David Seymour has said that publicly as recently as last week.
        
        13 1
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        April 30, 2025 11:42am
      - RoboRob
        
        ONE other party. If find it highly unlikely that ACT are fighting against spending cuts.
        
        I suspect even NZF wouldn’t be opposed to many of them. But your never know with Winston.
        
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        April 30, 2025 11:55am
    - Mike
      
      Willis is unlikely to be dumped after the next election, which would put her one up on Richardson.
      
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      April 30, 2025 10:38am
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Good, let’s hope
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:34am
  - Cassandra
    
    Piffle. Ruth Richardson has a deep understanding of her take on economics. Perhaps not so much on politics or strategy.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:04am
    - Cassandra
      
      Addressed to Mike.
      
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      April 30, 2025 11:16am
- RoboRob
  
  I wish that a basic economics course was a requirement for all new MPs. If they spent their first four weeks in an intensive economics course learning basics like ‘supply and demand’, we would have a much better country. We wouldn’t have Labour MPs saying things like, ‘increased insulation and heating for rentals wont effect rent prices’ or ‘if we print a billion dollars that wont effect inflation’.
  
  No idea how qualified or not Willis is. She comes across as understanding her role. Certainly her announcement of reduced extra spending is a step in the right direction, although not good for my wife who now works for the evil empire 🙂
  
  I am hoping against hope that some of the rumoured cost savings are the closure of entire government departments. However I think there is a less than 5% chance of that. This government doesn’t have the stones.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:46am
  - artemisia
    
    The Minister of Finance has announced very little new $ (operating) in the Budget, and said that if departments want something new they will have to find savings. That will mean closing stuff down, changing timing or finding efficiencies. It will be fascinating to see what gets closed down or delayed, if anything. If efficiencies, why haven’t they been found earlier.
    
    Or is it more likely it will be too hard and they’ll plug fingers in ears, go lalala and wait for a change of government.
    
    Or cancelling vacancies has worked well.
    
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    April 30, 2025 11:17am
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Well, today the education minister has rolled out finance as part of the school curriculum, this may help the dummies on the left. oh wait
    
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    April 30, 2025 1:31pm
- Mod88
  
  Because it is crooked and Corrupt
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:51am
- MCōs
  
  One person who was academically qualified to hold the related portfolio was Dr Reti and he didn’t last long.
  Similarly with Melissa Lee who spent many years as a journalist before making a poor Minister of Media and Communications
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:12am
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Let’s back up the truck on Reti. I seem to remember he was spokesman for health when Nats first went into opposition, he never lasted long there, so just perhaps they know when to cut and run. Reti always seemed to get bogged down in shit from the vulgar left and corrupt media, I note Brown does not, and great he is second guessing unions every chance he gets
    
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    April 30, 2025 10:40am
    - imalwaysright
      
      I think Reti was well intentioned but his big problem was he could see everyone’s point of view and lost sight of his own purpose.
      He tried to save everybody and ended up saving no one.
      
      8 2
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      April 30, 2025 12:07pm
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        My point is the same thing happened when in opposition, he lost his portfolio then as well
        
        3 1
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        April 30, 2025 1:32pm
      - Jack5
        
        MCos’s … Melissa Lee who spent many years as a journalist before making a poor Minister of Media and Communications ….
        
        Melissa Lee never had a chance. She spelled out her planned policy in a contributor-article on Kiwiblog a year or three ago while the Centre-Right was still in Opposition.
        
        The Lee policy addressed the problem of a bloc consisting of State-owned and State-subsidised media plus the Leftist NZ Herald.
        
        Luxon fired her from the Cabinet and the media role and sidelined her with an “environment” post.
        
        Her replacement, Paul Goldsmith, has been a useless Media and Communications Minister, pretty much content with the status quo, which is obviously what Luxon wanted.
        
        The Coalition takes a thrashing from the media, and worse will come now that the Government’s in the second half of its likely Parliamentary term. It will be hard to feel sorry for it.
        
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        April 30, 2025 2:22pm
- Taieri
  
  why the New Zealand political system keeps selecting totally unqualified people from both sides of politics
  ————
  
  This is a part of the wider phenomenon. It’s not just the Finance Ministers but the majority of politicians at both, central and local government level. It seems that more and more of them have had no exposure to the life outside of the politics, with the significant number of them with very limited life experience.
  
  An interesting analysis of the MPs career background can be found here:
  
  https://www.blacklandpr.com/_files/ugd/868372_1fd1fea6611b44dabd3442283a25b6b0.pdf?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:19am
  - imalwaysright
    
    The best are governed by the worst.
    
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    April 30, 2025 2:12pm
- G the giant from Dunedin
  
  So you don’t want her to cut budgets, or give no more new funding then? I guess you will agree with Hipkins saying oh this means 10s of billions wiped from services
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:34am
- kiwi_chileno
  
  Nearly all of Chile’s Finance Ministers have been economists and / or businessmen. (Chile has the advantage that no Minister can be current members of congress). This doesn’t always guarantee that the Ministers are the best, but they’re certainly not amateur duds and time-serving political caste hacks like Willis, Robertson, etc. It’s the Peter Principle exemplified – they’ve risen to “a level of respective incompetence”, promoted through party ranks until reaching a level – Finance Minister – at which they’re unskilled and incompetent. And as Rob McCulloch, Michael Reddell, and Brian Easton have pointed out, there’s been a hollowing-out of hard economics expertise in the Treasury and Reserve Bank.
  
  CV of Chile’s current leftist government’s technocrat Finance Minister – MA (Econ), Cambridge; helped design the fiscal structural balance / surplus policy under a centre-left government (basically pegs government spending to changes in real GDP); worked for the OECD, World Bank, etc and in the private sector; was Central Bank governor under right-wing President Sebastián Piñera (President 2010-14 and then 2018-22). Piñera was a billionaire businessman (named in the Pandora Papers) with an economics doctorate – a ‘Chicago Boy’, one of many Chilean liberal economists, who since the 1950’s, got their post-graduate degrees at the University of Chicago (Friedman, Harberger, etc), MIT, or Harvard.
  
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  April 30, 2025 12:34pm
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360668037/man-allegedly-connected-two-charity-bucket-thefts-new-plymouth

$11 for a milkshake !

This scrote is not the only one ripping-off people !
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April 30, 2025 9:03am
- Ghost
  
  If people pay $11 it’s their choice, and looking at their menu it’s not a normal milkshake. But hey, nice to attack the victims of crime
  
  https://www.deluxediner.co.nz/
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:48am
Scooter

Regarding the Juliana Herrera murder inquest, why did corrections or who ever was responsible after he was let out on parole not check on who he was living next to. Surely they would do a check on neighbours before placing him there. They believed him when he said the neighbours were elderly. They were concerned enough that they contacted a person he was seeing and knew any attractive woman near him was at a risk. Isn’t there a public notification for child sex offenders so why not for adults.
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April 30, 2025 9:18am
- Mike
  
  That’s one of the questions before the coroner: the scope and execution of the probation service’s responsibilities.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:40am
  - Paulus
    
    So far from the Government’s end that we have heard is people just covering their butts.
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:37pm
  - kiwimike
    
    no one will be sacked for not doing their job properly.
    That a woman was murdered will count for nothing..
    
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    May 1, 2025 4:28am
- Philview
  
  It was at a time we had a Labour Party policy of emptying out prisons. I doubt they cared what happened next.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:16am
Rusty

Are the power outages in Spain and Portugal a foretaste to what is coming on a world scale?
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April 30, 2025 9:33am
- Mike
  
  No.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:40am
  - RoboRob
    
    Just whats coming to NZ this winter 🙂
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:48am
    - kowtow
      
      Apparently our power cos have bought up and stocked up Bigly on King Coal!
      
      And a good thing too .( better if they bought local though , we have so much to use)
      
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      April 30, 2025 10:22am
      - David Garrett
        
        kowtow: As I understand it, other than the Huntly coal – which I believe is still on fire? – we don’t have the right kind of coal for Huntly and other coal fired stations – is that correct??
        
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        April 30, 2025 11:54am
      - RoboRob
        
        Generating 320 MW from Coal right now! A high 770MW from wind.
        
        Max coal output is 720MW. So great that they have the extra coal, they can run for longer BUT if there is now wind and solar that extra coal isn’t going to help much!
        
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        April 30, 2025 12:01pm
      - Ian Boag
        
        DG
        
        I think the thing with local coal is that it is relatively high quality coking stuff that can be exported for steel making etc. The imported Indonesian stuff is lower quality (probably means more sulphur?) and it is cheaper. As I understand things …..
        
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        April 30, 2025 12:48pm
      - Jack5
        
        NZ has tens of billions of tons of coal reserves, including the lignite of Southland, the same fuel that Germany uses in its thermal generation.
        
        The Huntly station was built there because it was surrounded by reserves of coal suitable for burning for power. The coal industry around Huntly has been continually reduced — before reserves were mined out — by anti-coal pressure from the global warming nuts, and that’s the reason we are importing shiploads of coal for the station from Indonesia.
        
        There are plenty of coalfields with fuel-quality coal in the South Island, including the vast lignite fields in Southland. One of the last coalfields, still far, far from exhausted is being closed or has been closed in Ohai-Nightcaps, Southland. Adding insult, the big new industry in the area is planting pines for carbon credits.
        
        The lignite reserves in Southland could generate all of NZ’s electricity for centuries, and there’s another big untapped resource in NZ”s coalfields: coal seam gas (CSG).
        
        Queensland, which is investing heavily in liquefication of gas for export, will be processing millions of dollars of CSG — as well as other natural gas — for export.
        
        This means that NZ, its own natural gas exploration stopped by Ardern, will end up importing Queensland liquefied natural gas (LNG). Some of this will be LNG liquefied from Queensland CSG, a resource of our own that NZ ignores.
        
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        April 30, 2025 2:47pm
      - kowtow
        
        DG
        
        Don’t know , but Rotowaro mine is still operating . I see they don’t list Huntly as a customer .
        As I understand it , and am open to correction , it is from here that Huntly used to get its coal.
        
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        April 30, 2025 2:58pm
      - Jack5
        
        Adding to Kowtow’s point (2.58 post) …
        
        The Rotowaro mine, 10km from Huntly, is producing low-sulphur, sub-bituminous, thermal coal.
        
        The miner, Bathurst Resources, says the coal is “sought after” by steel makers, lime manufacturers, meat works, and timber processors and other light industrial plants.
        
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        April 30, 2025 3:18pm
- MCōs
  
  Why would that be, Rusty?
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:49am
  - RoboRob
    
    Because most of the world has pushed into less reliable ‘green’ generation that is harder to balance against demand. Most countries are having more difficulty meeting demand consistantly. Do you recall anything like this happening in Spain before? What has changed?
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:52am
    - Ian Boag
      
      Sounds like it could be a “grid crash” sort of blackout – there have been one or two in North America (long time ago) as I recall …. nothing to do with net zero. Power grids are not just a whole lot of things connected by wires …..
      
      The Grid: The Fraying Wires Between Americans and Our Energy Future by Gretchen Bakke.
      
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      April 30, 2025 12:53pm
    - R
      
      They, like NZ in the near future, are reaping the benefits of the Green ideology
      
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      April 30, 2025 12:55pm
  - Ghost
    
    Spain PM has asked people not to speculate so the world has speculated. Will be interesting to see the actual cause of this
    
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    April 30, 2025 9:58am
    - MCōs
      
      Maybe a crucial pylon fell over during maintenance
      Maybe sabotage by Basque separatists
      Maybe Basque separatists infiltrated the pylon maintenance gangs?
      
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      April 30, 2025 10:21am
      - G the giant from Dunedin
        
        Or a test run from Russia and China to stymie your opposition with dirty tactics
        
        6 1
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        April 30, 2025 10:42am
      - Rusty
        
        McCos
        
        Maybe they weren’t paying their power bills on time?
        
        2 0
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        April 30, 2025 2:07pm
      - GJM
        
        Someone undid all the bolts holding down a pylon while doing maintenance?
        
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        April 30, 2025 2:49pm
    - Taieri
      
      Will be interesting to see the actual cause of this
      ———-
      
      As reported by Reuters:
      
      “A massive blackout that hit most of the Iberian Peninsula on Monday was due to a sudden, large drop in power supply that caused the grid interconnection between Spain and France to trip, according to Spanish grid operator REE”
      
      https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/spain-portugals-blackout-originated-interconnection-with-france-la-vanguardia-2025-04-28/
      
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      April 30, 2025 10:26am
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      Well, it’s not likely to be the ” rare atmospheric phenomenon” that the lefty media were quick to promote yesterday…
      
      According to some Portuguese media outlets, the claim was first announced by Reuters before later being retracted.
      
      and
      
      However, REN has now reportedly denied that it ever provided this information,
      
      (REN is Portugal’s electric network Redes Energéticas Nacionais)
      
      https://www.iflscience.com/did-a-rare-atmospheric-phenomenon-trigger-a-massive-power-outage-across-spain-and-portugal-78994
      
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      April 30, 2025 10:31am
      - Master Mariner
        
        The only possible cause from an atmospheric condition is a Solar Flare ( We are at Solar Maximum).
        These take a good 24 hrs+ to reach Earth and are forecasted and prewarned in advance, Mainly because of satelite outages and Electric Grid systems are vulnerable.
        Sounds like someone is telling a few porkies and deflecting.
        
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        April 30, 2025 11:43am
    - Eastlander
      
      Perhaps the ingenious hidalgo of La Mancha is up to his old tricks again – but with more success.
      
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      April 30, 2025 3:50pm
    - Paulus
      
      Do you think we will have anything from the Spanish Authorities that we could believe ?
      
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      April 30, 2025 5:39pm
  - Rusty
    
    MCos
    
    Just asking a question.
    
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    April 30, 2025 2:10pm
- keepcalmcarryon
  
  Yes if the de growthers get their way and fossil fuels ditched before there are adequate replacements.
  
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  April 30, 2025 9:56am
- Scooter
  
  Not an unreasonable question, first there was COVID for lockdowns/control and power cuts for the same.
  
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  April 30, 2025 10:04am
- Philview
  
  I do wonder how 3 countries were impacted. Something doesn’t smell right about this story and I don’t think it was about atmospheric conditions or renewables. We have situations where the power is out but not cell coverage as well.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:22am
  - wsk12345
    
    Pretty simple. Portugal and Spain are integrated so when the cascade failure occurred it took out both. And the interconnecter to France failed affecting France.
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:18pm
  - Scooter
    
    Italy was not affected but then Meloni is in charge.
    
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    April 30, 2025 6:13pm
Swifty

The Left started this stuff with their disgraceful anti-white, anti-male, anti-aged, anti-heterosexual rhetoric in recent years – but now they’re complaining now that they’re on the receiving end of it!

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/indonz/559462/ethnic-mps-condemn-race-based-criticism-of-their-political-work

Boo hoo.

Call yourselves a whaaaaaaaambulance!
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April 30, 2025 10:22am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I don’t want to see any race/age/sex/religion criticism of folks for holding contrary views… but it does seem that our MSM expects mature white males to “suck it up”
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360669587/male-mature-canterbury-new-research-shows-gaps-matariki-support
  
  Seems an extraordinary waste of money for the Ministry for Culture & Heritage to be undertaking annual reviews of NZers’ engagement with Matariki.
  
  If folks aren’t interested in “celebrating” a regular, common, predictable event, then so what?
  
  Are we all expected to dance around a maypole tonight, or don a black beret and go marching tomorrow for the “workers”?
  
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  April 30, 2025 1:14pm
  - Swifty
    
    “If folks aren’t interested in “celebrating” a regular, common, predictable event, then so what?”
    
    Exactly right. So what indeed.
    
    But of course many New Zealanders, including many in our news media, would see that as a symptom of racism, not mere indifference as it is in my case.
    
    They see racism everywhere, including where there is none present.
    
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    April 30, 2025 3:32pm
- Plumbs
  
  [Mod – debate without the personal abuse]I am a lefty and proud of it,I want the govt,to run a lean mean economy .ie I do not want hospital cleaners etc to have their wages raided to pay for malingerers,dole bludgers and wastrels at all.Whilst I am appalled at Stalins antics I do not think he would have condoned shirkers.However it needs to be fixed with a scalpel not an axe.I would have all sickness beneficiaries checked by military medics ,too many gypping the system as it stands.We are a low wage economy,unfortunately and so the top earners need to pay more tax,me amongst them,however I do what I can by spreading a bit of largesse through the community,call it noblesse oblige.I can afford 3 meals a day and a few beersies.And come to oz to watch an election,having worked and paid taxes for 57 years.
  
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  April 30, 2025 5:07pm
  - Paulus
    
    Our Minimum Wage is approximately three times that of the USA !
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:40pm
    - Plumbs
      
      How is that going Pauli’s.The country is in terminal decline.Do what I have done young fella and go to Detroit and Shanghai,it is blatantly obvious who has the improving society/economy and it is not the good old USA.Take your rose fainted glasses off and a smell the roses.End of.
      
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      April 30, 2025 6:50pm
  - NothingLeft
    
    We are not a low wage economy.
    
    Average wage in NZ is $8-90k a year, top half of OECD, higher then UK, Ireland, Sweden, Finland, Italy, Japan.
    
    Aus is ~15% higher and US ~30% higher.
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:53pm
- PurplePen
  
  What an odd piece of research to do. You can’t forcefully create a tradition and even if you did it won’t have any significance to anyone except those that end up growing up with it occur every year and they then pass it on to their kids. That’s how Christmas is. You also can’t expect some effectively foreign pseudo Tradition to every have much meaning to anyone outside those that already have grown up with it within their culture.
  
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  April 30, 2025 5:55pm
leoj

Does anyone really care about Audrey Young’s ministerial ratings?
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April 30, 2025 10:26am
- RoboRob
  
  NO. They were pathetic when Labour was in, with JA etc scoring crazy high even though her leadership was poor and her ministry (children) was going backwards.
  
  Heard Hosking and Mitchel making a big deal of them this morning, cause apparently they are good for National. Fools. Just becuase the data suits you now doesn’t mean you should talk up the source.
  
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  April 30, 2025 12:04pm
Maggy Wassilieff

Here’s probably the best analysis to date as to why Spain & Portugal had their blackout:

https://newzealandenergy.substack.com/p/spain-lacks-intertia?r=8t72p&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true
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April 30, 2025 10:36am
- Taieri
  
  A very interesting reading. I was quite surprised that a very small frequency drop of 0.5 Hz can have such far reaching consequences. In marine generating plants the allowable frequency drop is about 1.5 Hz, i.e. the frequency change from 50Hz to 48.5 Hz or from 50Hz to 51.5 Hz doesn’t cause any problems at all and the corrective response is usually very rapid. Of course the size and scale of marine generation is much smaller than in land based grids, but still…
  One is learning all the time:-)
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:14am
  - wsk12345
    
    I think that wind and solar cannot cope with frequency fluctuations and many tripled causing a further fall of frequency. If they do t have load shedding to arrest the fall then the more robust plants will also trip. I gather that the renewables tripped some 10 GW (15%) which is probably outside anything they modelled.
    
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    April 30, 2025 5:23pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  and this…
  
  https://www.joannenova.com.au/2025/04/blackout-in-spain-to-cost-2-4-billion-euro-likely-due-to-solar-plants-blind-and-biased-abc-says-cause-is-a-mystery/
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:20am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    From the article;
    
    “The 2-4 billion Euro bill plus the expenses for Big-backup-Batteries and extra interconnectors must now be added to the electricity bill estimates of solar and wind power. All the past costs per kilowatt of magical Spanish solar power were all obviously fantasy underestimates. People thought solar was cheap, but it was all an illusion.”
    
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    April 30, 2025 7:56pm
G the giant from Dunedin

I note filthy One News are advertising a hit job over the union/Labour doctors strikes. Spouting to people who want to listen. listen to patients that have been effected, even though the strike has not happened yet.

It’s great Brown is getting in first saying an offer was made and the unions did not even take it too their members.
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April 30, 2025 10:45am
- rockape
  
  The deal they rejected was a pretty generous one. Around 8% plus a bonus payment of $8k. Nurses on the other hand have been offered 1%.
  
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  April 30, 2025 11:52am
  - Ian Boag
    
    SMO (consultant) in the family said theirs was 1% …. noted that lower end of SMO scale now topped by upper end of RMO scale.
    
    (SMO = senior doctor, RMO = junior doctor)
    
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    April 30, 2025 12:58pm
    - rockape
      
      Here is the offer. irst-year specialist would receive a $17,700 (9.5%) increase on base salary due to removal of steps 1-3. All other salary related remuneration (eg KiwiSaver) would increase by 9.5% as well. In the following year, this specialist would receive a $12,211 (6.0%) base salary increase due to step progression and a 2% increase on Step 5.
      
      A second-year specialist would receive a $11,800 (6.2%) pay increase on base salary. All other salary related remuneration (eg KiwiSaver) would increase by 6.2% as well. In the following year, this doctor would receive a $12,211 (6.0%) base salary increase due to step progression and a 2% increase on Step 5.
      
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      April 30, 2025 2:31pm
  - G the giant from Dunedin
    
    Brown said the deal did not get put to the doctors
    
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    April 30, 2025 1:34pm
    - Paulus
      
      Unions decide whether the members get to know what they are doing
      – remember the Union people get the same rises as the people they represent.
      
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      April 30, 2025 5:42pm
    - kiwimike
      
      they didn’t need too.
      Their membership had already spoken.
      Brown knew that, he’s telling porkies.
      
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      May 1, 2025 4:37am
rangitoto

Trump is now bored with just being POTUS and wants to be the new Pope as well. Look for Orange smoke from the Vatican. https://x.com/i/status/1917331380297478530
8 5
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April 30, 2025 11:21am
- Don Beckett
  
  He says Cardinal Dolan from New York is very good.
  I think most American Catholics would disagree with him – Dolan is a liberal progressive, the type that has caused division & confusion in the Church. Cdl. Bourke, on the other hand…………
  
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  April 30, 2025 4:13pm
rouppe

Judge Ema Aitken loses case to stop panel looking at her conduct

Good job.
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April 30, 2025 12:14pm
Ghost

Well, hopefully there isn’t a third time….

A man who was ruled insane after committing a high-profile killing more than two decades ago has gone on to kill another person.

The case, which is shrouded in secrecy, occurred “against a backdrop of apparent significant failures in the mental health system”, a High Court judge says.

RNZ can exclusively reveal the man — who was made a special patient under the Mental Health Act after his first killing — was recently found not guilty of murder by reason of insanity for a second time after killing someone he believed was possessed.

Article
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April 30, 2025 1:28pm
- Paulus
  
  Why is Mental Health increasing exponentially, in every respect, in New Zealand in very recent times.
  Particularly among the younger people ?
  
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  April 30, 2025 5:45pm
- NothingLeft
  
  That $2 Billion pissed away by Labour on mental health with no visible result really paid dividends.
  
  We really need to be more willing to keep dangerous people away from the general public over the long term. Publics rights not to be assaulted or murdered should come before criminals ‘rights’ to enjoy freedom.
  
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  April 30, 2025 5:59pm
Mike

How dumb are some people?

In President Trump’s first 100 days we’ve seized over 22 million fentanyl laced pills, saving over 119 Million lives.

https://x.com/AGPamBondi/status/1917311265774727323
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April 30, 2025 1:35pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  What’s the problem?
  
  Do you doubt that 3000 lbs of fentanyl powder could kill 119 Million folks?
  
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  April 30, 2025 2:16pm
  - Northshoredoc
    
    Quod erat demonstrandum.
    
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    April 30, 2025 2:32pm
  - Mike
    
    This truly moronic tweet claimed that one third of Americans would have died had that amount of fentanyl not been seized.
    
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    April 30, 2025 2:55pm
    - Colville
      
      Sadly I am forced to agree with Mike.
      
      There is a huge difference between could have killed and would have killed.
      
      119 mil is all the fentanyl deaths in USA for approx 1500 years at current rates.
      
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      April 30, 2025 3:50pm
      - Mike
        
        They might as well claim that fentanyl seizures over the last five years saved the lives of all Americans.
        
        5 6
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        April 30, 2025 4:49pm
    - Conservatarian
      
      Mike, please estimate how much of this particular massive haul of fentanyl could St George Floyd (bless his holy name) have freshly consumed before dying, only for race communists in Minneapolis and across the world bored from lockdown to have ignored and instead attributed to a diminutive policeman’s knee?
      
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      April 30, 2025 4:14pm
      - Mike
        
        Really? You really want to argue that?
        
        4 7
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        April 30, 2025 5:56pm
- Graeme Hall
  
  Good question Mike: “Producing illicit fentanyl is not an exact science. Two milligrams of fentanyl can be lethal depending on a person’s body size, tolerance and past usage. DEA analysis has found counterfeit pills ranging from .02 to 5.1 milligrams (more than twice the lethal dose) of fentanyl per tablet.”
  
  https://www.dea.gov/resources/facts-about-fentanyl
  
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  April 30, 2025 2:51pm
  - Colville
    
    Graeme.
    
    Its a wildly strong narcotic that can be brewed with very low tech gear. A large part of the lethality problem starts when the fentanyl is mixed with a bulk filler to put into pills. If the F isnt ground super fine, if it itsnt blended well then a pill can get a little too much and person taking pill dies.
    
    80,000 a year is USA and mostly all people addicted to pain killers like oxycodone.
    
    A dose of fentanyl the size of 2 grains of white sugar s lethal.
    
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    April 30, 2025 4:00pm
Sparrow

This is hilarious. I earlier wrote a blog about my concerns ref the political system with regard to the Minister of Finance. Lo and behold just an hour ago I recieved proof that it is a f…up system. Without going into details I was having a long email exchange with an Associate Minister without getting anywhere. Frankly being fobbed off. So I wrote to the Minister. This was two months ago. Suddenly I get an acknowledgement from the Ministers office just now no signature no name saying my enquiry was being passed to the Associate Minister ,!!! Obviously nobody had read my email in this ” pass the parcel,” game. Probably my email had reached the top of the pile after two months and a machine had replied, simply put it told me to f.o. Ladies and Gentlemen it does not matter a dot who is in power we the unwashed don’t count in the scheme of things today. Just a number. Cynical yes but true ,?
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April 30, 2025 1:35pm
Sparrow

Read Bryce Edwards article Affluent Pathway to Parliament. It answers many of our questions and why things have gone wrong. Thankfully we have a commentator such as Bryce.
8 2
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April 30, 2025 3:06pm
Ghost

Looking at the artist impression I don’t think this is a rainbow crossing, this is just a coloured mess

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360671664/it-not-about-being-woke-why-city-pressed-pause-rainbow-crossing
5 1
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April 30, 2025 6:11pm
Tom Barker

Will prison inmates who are found to have been wrongly convicted receive an extra vote for every one they were deprived of while unjustly convicted? And if not, why not?
3 5
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April 30, 2025 6:14pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Covered by general compensation, Tom. In the same way that the State cannot give you an extra day in your life to balance each day spent in prison.
  
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  April 30, 2025 7:46pm
- Swifty
  
  Should Labour supporters be forced to pay back New Zealanders two dollars for every one dollar that Grant Robertson took off them and pissed up against a wall?
  
  If not, why not?
  
  6 1
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  April 30, 2025 9:28pm
Ghost

Little rules out Tory as deputy mayor

https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360671973/my-home-has-been-wellington-andrew-little-says-he-loyal-capital-city
3 0
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April 30, 2025 7:47pm
- greybeard
  
  Yet another puff-piece by a lefty writer for Little. There will be many more, but very few for anyone else.
  
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  May 1, 2025 6:33am
NothingLeft

How to fix the west’s fertility problem at near zero cost:

Legally entitle all women (and perhaps men) who have 3 or more kids without welfare support to use a special honorific title like madam, dame or similar, perhaps confer a specific noticeable social advantage (eg legislated ability to jump lines, special parking privileges, use of bus lanes etc).

Or how about a ring you can wear based on number of kids – the puts you ahead of anyone with less than you for anything in limited supply (queuing, services etc).

And then watch our status focused psychology part the waters that currently ‘prevent’ people from having kids.

Or on negative side; legislatively ban women without kids from being able to posting anything on social media to more than 10 people.

The primary motivator of humans is status.
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April 30, 2025 8:04pm

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