General Debate 05 June 2024 | Kiwiblog (2024)

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Comments (304) Mike Maggy Wassilieff MCōs thirteenstars Steve Otto(North Shore) Red Steve Otto(North Shore) CRM114 MCōs Mike Steve Otto(North Shore) jkt MCōs Steve Otto(North Shore) Ghost Steve Otto(North Shore) Homas Steve Otto(North Shore) Manu-Rau Ghost Mike Benedict Yu Steve Otto(North Shore) NothingLeft Steve Otto(North Shore) Nigel Kearney Mike Steve Otto(North Shore) Paulus Mike Steve Otto(North Shore) the deity formerly known as nigel6888 Mike Steve Otto(North Shore) Ra Henare Steve Otto(North Shore) Chuck Bird Diogenes Steve Otto(North Shore) the deity formerly known as nigel6888 judith8409121 Clown Benedict Yu Taieri Benedict Yu Taieri Steve Otto(North Shore) Master Mariner Steve Otto(North Shore) Pineapple Lumps jkt kowtow All_on_Red Benedict Yu Nukuleka Benedict Yu Chuck Bird kevn jkt Benedict Yu Benedict Yu comm4nder Benedict Yu NothingLeft sirknz Master Mariner Pineapple Lumps Mike Pineapple Lumps G the giant from Dunedin Grumpy Silver Top Steve Otto(North Shore) Clown Mike Steve Otto(North Shore) jkt Steve Otto(North Shore) Chris Nisbet Maggie Pie mrtinkyholloway jedmo imalwaysright Benedict Yu imalwaysright NothingLeft peterwn Taieri Master Mariner sirknz imalwaysright peterwn Benedict Yu Steve Otto(North Shore) imalwaysright Chuck Bird imalwaysright Jake Dee Steve Otto(North Shore) Paulus jkt artemisia Inandout artemisia riffer Benedict Yu Grumpy Silver Top greybeard Paulus Mike Benedict Yu cmm kowtow Handyman cmm MCōs artemisia Steve Otto(North Shore) Handyman mogg MCōs Grumpy Silver Top AitchW MCōs Pineapple Lumps backster I remember when G152 Grumpy Silver Top MCōs Mike trout artemisia Simon Benedict Yu Grunter Grunter Benedict Yu mandk Taieri Benedict Yu Taieri Pineapple Lumps cmm john1234 mandk cmm Taieri NothingLeft pdm All_on_Red Grumpy Silver Top AitchW wsk12345 JimBobJoe Benedict Yu Grunter Handyman Inandout artemisia NothingLeft miltonF JimBobJoe JimBobJoe Pineapple Lumps MCōs Steve Otto(North Shore) Master Mariner Colinxy kowtow Jake Dee Colinxy kiwikidsnz Gravelroad riffer Swifty Jack5 Graham Sharpe NothingLeft Taieri NeverMindTheBollocks Steve Otto(North Shore) jkt All_on_Red jkt Paulus jkt Maggie Pie lifesgood softail 1450 Steve Otto(North Shore) Steve Otto(North Shore) mogg Nukuleka cmm john1234 RoboRob MCōs NothingLeft lifesgood cmm MCōs Flossie MCōs All_on_Red Ghost MCōs waikatosinger MCōs graham mandk Maggy Wassilieff cmm Rusty peterwn cmm jkt MCōs waikatosinger Hugh Jarse greybeard Grunter Maggy Wassilieff Master Mariner Rusty Swifty cmm Paulus Jack5 Maggy Wassilieff Blog-aholic rouppe Wayne Mapp Taieri cmm Hugh Jarse Paulus Jack5 waikatosinger mogg Suze Wainwright jkt artemisia BananaLlama BananaLlama MCōs Mike Pineapple Lumps softail 1450 cmm David Garrett cmm Jack5 Mike Jack5 mogg cmm Grunter Ra Henare Grunter Jack5 Grunter Jack5 All_on_Red Grunter virtualmark Maggie Pie Taieri sirknz WaynelSexton mogg Jack5 Steve Otto(North Shore) Steve Otto(North Shore) Gravelroad artemisia Ghost Arthur Fleck Gravelroad mandk Flossie Libertarians are right sirknz cmm Paulus MCōs Ra Henare Keith White Red thirteenstars Benedict Yu cmm thirteenstars MCōs cmm Maggie Pie Benedict Yu Stu2 fernglas Steve Otto(North Shore) Prince Prince Scooter Ghost Maggie Pie Add a Comment

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  • Mike

    Happy Arbor Day!

  • Steve Otto(North Shore)

    77 years without a criminal record.
    Runs for President and bangs up over 90 in one year!

    • CRM114

      Better late than never I guess.

    • MCōs

      Power corrupts

      • Mike

        He was always a crook. Getting into pokitics just gave him more exposure to scrutiny of his sordid personal and professional life.

        • Steve Otto(North Shore)

          Whatever you say Mike. That crook is going to win.
          He lives rent free in your head.
          Trump 2024.

          • jkt

            You and Mike agree on something!
            It must be International Arbor Day!

          • MCōs

            At least you pay the rent

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            Keeps him happy jkt

          • Ghost

            He will be president for a little bit, more important is the vice president of both candidates who will take over once these elderly presidents kick the bucket

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            Ghost,
            Donald Trump Junior of course.
            Not Ivanka, she is a closet Dem.

        • Homas

          If only he’d had Pelosi’s stock-picking talents he could have built an honest fortune.

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            Yeah just like Paul did.

        • Manu-Rau

          @ Mike @ 9.32am

          Really? If you’re so sure, why don’t you post an allegation like that under your real name?

          • Ghost

            I’m willing to bet his real name is, ummm, Mike.

          • Mike

            It’s hardly necessary to protect oneself when uttering patently correct opinions.
            Anonymity on Kiwiblog is necessary to guard against the sort of doxxing experienced by stephieboy and Benedict Yu.

          • Benedict Yu

            Give me a break.

            The internet is full of so many nasty opinions on Donald Trump, I doubt that one more from Mike is going to cause DPF to be sued for defamation.

            That is why there are moderators here.

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            @ Benedict – 1.36pm.
            What a nice way of saying Mike is talking sh*t. 🙂

      • NothingLeft

        Power corrupts and every day the USA’s permanent elite administrative class AKA deep state, with their Democrat party front illustrates just how badly that corruptions can impact a country.

        Frank Herbert’s formulation; “Power attracts the corruptible”, is more accurate I think.

        • Steve Otto(North Shore)

          Why are the Democrats throwing everything they have got at Trump to try and stop him? He hurt them bad post 2016. He did win 2020 but it was stolen by Obama and co. Now this time around the Dems are desperate. The corruption by the swamp goes back decades, they don’t want to lose it.
          When Trump wins he will attack that swamp so hard. He underestimated the size of it last time.
          Thing is he only has 4 years. Who will be POTUS come 2028? Junior?

    • Nigel Kearney

      Based an entire business career on saying things then not doing them and not paying his bills.

      Gets convicted of paying for something he should not have, in order to avoid people talking about something he actually did.

      That’s really unlucky.

      • Mike

        Too Much and Never Enough

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        That hooker was paid to break the confidentiality agreement. It was only $130K ffs. Right before the 2016 Election. Of course he wanted the hush money confidential, but that is not illegal.
        But that is not what Trump was charged for. Somehow they pinned the way the payment to Cohen as corrupt. $130K yet the man is a billionaire!
        That is how the deep state works

        • Paulus

          As still not sure he actually did anything illegal, but in the USA anything to suit can be judged for a political price.

        • Mike

          If you believe he is a billionaire, then he might just have a casino or university to sell you.

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        Where do you people find these things?
        CNN?

    • the deity formerly known as nigel6888

      Whew, so unlucky! Should have stayed a Democrat…

      • Mike

        Democrats refused to take him seriously. He then realized the yuuge potential for grift in running for office, and America electing a black man fuelled his rage.

        • Steve Otto(North Shore)

          He likes money, but not money from the swamp. Democrat Party in 2001, then Republican Party in 2009.

    • Ra Henare

      I would check your calculator! 99 criminal records?
      A refernce would be nice, or is this your opinion

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        “over” 90

  • Chuck Bird

    I heard on the news last night that May was the coldest May in 15 years, So much for a climate emergency.

    • Diogenes

      Just think, Chuck — if it weren’t for global warming, May would have been even colder!

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        That is how they think! There is a name for that, can’t recall it.

        • the deity formerly known as nigel6888

          Heads they win, Tails you lose.

          Simple really. Feel the sciencism!

          Must trust the system, otherwise where would we all be?

    • Clown

      The loonies went from calling it ‘Global Warming’ to ‘Climate Change’ – so eat your bugs, get back into your pod and pray at your Chloe Swarbrick shrine.

      • Benedict Yu

        Regular readers will be aware that I am a vocal critic of New Zealand climate change policies.

        However it is futile to argue that global mean temperatures are not rising.

        • Taieri

          global mean temperatures are not rising
          ————-

          And what precisely is a “global mean temperature”?

          Is it established the same way as a “global mean telephone number”?

          • Taieri

            Your comment just proves my point. It is impossible to have a rational discussion on this topic here without triggering people.
            —————

            I’m aware of the method of calculating it.
            What I question is its usefulness and validity, as per below.

            “Some land and sea regions have inadequate numbers of weather stations or buoys to provide safe temperatures for particular grid points. The grid points with missing temperatures can be handled by not providing a value, estimating a missing value based on surrounding values, or using patterns from the satellite observations to aid in estimating values from the surface temperature data sets”

            One particular assertion catches the eye:
            “(…)estimating a missing value based on surrounding values(…)”.
            This is a complete garbage. Quite often the temperatures in Dunedin City and Mosgiel can differ by say 5 or 6 deg C. This is due mainly to the topography and local climate variations. Yet the distance between these two localities is only about 10 km. There can be even greater variations between Dunedin City and Dunedin Airport, particularly in winter. Another example are the temperature changes along the SH87 – these can vary by as much as 10 deg C over very short distances, such as from Middlemarch to Deep Stream. What’s most important is that there’s no discernible pattern to these variations. They are completely random.
            There’s a countless number of such examples in NZ, let alone the World.

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            I will tell you the long story about Exit Glacier Alaska. Benedict.

          • Master Mariner

            Yep agree,
            However the earths mean pressure 1012.5 Hpa /Mb has stayed the same. On the surface / Sea level.
            Easily corrected for altitude etc.

            https://chem.libretexts.org/Courses/University_of_California_Davis/UCD_Chem_002A/UCD_Chem_2A/Text/Unit_III%3A_Physical_Properties_of_Gases/06.03_Relationships_among_Pressure_Temperature_Volume_and_Amount

            So with this in mind and very accurate pressure measurements going back 200 + years ( For a mean pressure reading) then why has not pressure increased ( Mean sea level) for the increase in temperature ?

            I honestly do not think anyone has seriously looked at this.!

            Serious question ?

        • Steve Otto(North Shore)

          Something about a mini ice-age 10,000 years ago?
          Or does that not count?
          This planet has been through a lot of sh*t in 4.5 billion years. It heals itself. Even with a nuclear war the planet will be ok. It will also survive long after the humans have gone.

          • Pineapple Lumps

            Great comment!

            The assertion that temperature is going up and this is a disaster is baseless fear mongering. We have only been able to measure this for a blink of an eye of the history of the planet.

            Like you say Steve the planet is a complex system that is quite capable of a high degree of self regulation.

        • jkt

          “This impact is literally zero!” This = Anthropogenic CO2.

          “Global mean temperatures” are bouncing around. There is ‘scientific consensus’ that the Global Mean Temperature is increasing.

          The alarmist theory is that the Global Mean Temperature is increasing and that the earth will soon be boiling. If true, …. we better pursue net zero.

          So it is good that we all now know that the “impact is literally zero” and that we can get back to growing the economy and break the back of energy poverty.

        • kowtow

          Can it be argued that the temperatures are being manipulated, given you’ve spent 3 years studying this.

          UHI effect , urbanisation , adjusting raw material to ‘hide the decline’ , Weather stations predominantly in the northern hemisphere etc

          • All_on_Red

            I think all those points are valid but as a generalisation the trend does show that temps in the Northern Hemisphere are rising and not so much in the Southern.
            Its just that the rise is modest and we shouldnt be alarmed.
            We just need to adapt.

    • Benedict Yu

      You are confusing climate and weather.

      • Nukuleka

        I take it that English is not your first language, Ben.

        • Benedict Yu

          Perhaps, but I would wager that my English proficiency is much higher than many native English speakers in New Zealand. I also devoted three years to studying, and working full time, on climate change. So there is that.

          • Chuck Bird

            “I also devoted three years to studying, and working full time, on climate change.”

            Have you read anything of Dr Judith Curry or Dr Steven Koonin? If not, have you even viewed their YouTube videos?

          • jkt

            Chuck

            Benedict Yu has studied and worked on climate change extensively and says, and I quote “This impact is literally zero.”

            He is on the same page as Judith and Koonin.

          • Benedict Yu

            I have watched a couple of Judith Curry’s videos but not lately. AFAIK she does not dispute that the earth is warming. Rather she disputes the causes, and what can be done about it.

            To be clear, my view is:

            – the earth is warming
            – if we end up with 4 degrees plus of warming that will be very bad indeed
            – politicians cannot do much about it, especially those leading small countries like New Zealand.

            If we take China, its emissions will peak and decline. If for no other reason than it does not want its citizens living with current levels of pollution. Same with India.

            For New Zealand to tank its economy and society on the alter of climate change is insane.

            What will solve the problem? Technology and markets.

            Where I part company from many commenters here is with those who hold that the earth is not warming and or that if it is warming it is nothing to be worried about.

            Hopefully that helps anyone who wishes to understand my views :-).

          • Benedict Yu

            ““This impact is literally zero.””

            Well spotted 🙂 Not quite correct. I actually said that attempts to reduce New Zealand’s emissions will have literally zero impact on the earth’s climate.

          • comm4nder

            Why will 4 degrees warming “be very bad indeed”?
            The earth has been much warmer in even the recent past. I’m sure it is 4 degrees warmer by the time you get to work than when you get out of bed each day.
            Please Benedict, read some of the science. I respect your opinions and don’t like to see you taken in by alarmism that is based on speculative computer programs, not reality.

          • Benedict Yu

            “Why will 4 degrees warming “be very bad indeed”?

            Well, let us look in the other direction – ie COLDER than today. 11,000 years ago during the last glacial maximum, mean temperatures were only 6 degrees colder than today.

            https://news.ucar.edu/132755/scientists-nail-down-average-temperature-last-ice-age

            That was enough to bury North America and Europe under 1 km of ice – together with most of the South Island. So, you can see that 4 degrees warmer is a hell of a lot.

            The last time that the earth was as warm as now was about 100,000 years ago.

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Interglacial

            “I’m sure it is 4 degrees warmer by the time you get to work than when you get out of bed each day.”

            Yes but the global mean temperature does not change at all while I am travelling to work. 🙂

          • NothingLeft

            Yes warming, no not a significant problem to waste any time stressing about. There are several truly existential risks:

            1/ AI, will be the end of humans, whether in 50 years or 50 thousand, at best we will be constrained pets denied any real agency – living in a gilded cage, and if we are preserved we will likely be subject to major genetic modification to suit the AI’s preferences – weed out whatever it considers undesirable and enhance whatever it sees as valuable, maybe we are morphed into smart, robust, docile and cheap to manufacture labourers, or turned into human-chihuahuas. Superintelligence is entirely unreliant upon others and has no need to emotions or concepts like fondness or retaining our good will. It will do whatever it wants any time it chooses, humans be damned.

            2/An engineered super virus from a smart individual (PhD level) or small group of zealots could wipe us out, risk grows with every day as genetic engineering tech gets cheaper and easier. Covid was the first relatively benign example.

            3/ Nuclear war could starve 80-90% of the population and set civilisation back a few hundred years. Though that would at least buy more time before AI ends us.

            4/ Climate change is by comparison the tiniest of nothing burgers. A degree or two of warming outside of tropics (it won’t be more as ocean thermal inertia limits rate of rise) caused by transient fossil fuel consumption splurge – that will be supplanted by cheaper power alternatives in next few decades. It’s clearly an irrelevancy. Equivalent to seeing slightly more rain and moving a 1-200km closer to the equator which for most will improve their lives. There is no evidence of any speed up in ice loss or sea level rise https://www.sonel.org/-Sea-level-trends-.html?lang=en. Current sea level rate of rise is absolutely normal compared to typical 2-5mm/yr rates up and down over last 8 thousand years (it has been much higher in past). Be aware that the global climate models can’t model atmospheric processes involved in cloud creation, convection, water phase change, cloud-radiation and ice crystal interaction, thunderstorms and hurricanes, wave upper-ocean thermal mixing, and a whole lot else besides. They are utter junk as tools to accurately predict 0.1% changes in global heat flux that they would need to do to be useful. And supercomputers would need to be at least thousands of trillions of times faster to have any hope of modelling the physics accurately at the scales needed. Aside from short-term weather prediction they only have value as priestly devices for fund raising haruspicy in service of Climate Millenialism Cult.

      • sirknz

        If it is good enough for the climate change true believers to use weather events as proof of their doctrines…

      • Master Mariner

        Correct.
        Climate = 30+ years.
        even the UN Meterological Office gets this confused.

        https://wmo.int/topics/extreme-weather

        They are also the Organisation to associate Singapore Airline Turbulence injuries with Climate change.

        The UN has a lot to answer for in this current World we find ourselves in.

      • Pineapple Lumps

        BY – you are confusing extrapolation of small data sets and having a simplistic understanding of complicated systems with facts.

        • Mike

          No, he isn’t.

          • Pineapple Lumps

            Does having Mikes support make the position stronger or …?

    • G the giant from Dunedin

      They weee quick to point out how warm June has been even though yesterday was only June 4

    • Grumpy Silver Top

      Global warming, pshaw! It’s climate change, thanks to Mother Nature. Mankind is a pimple on her chin.

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        See my comment about 4.5 billion years and the planet after humans have tried to f*ck it

        • Clown

          You’re welcome to give up your internet, computer, heating and all the rest of the comforts of modern civilisation to reduce your carbon trail and champion the cause. I could offer more ways, but those would likely to get me banned. But I’m guessing you’re like another typical Green Party member: hypocrite.

          • Mike

            Spoiler alert: Steve is not a greenie.

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            Thanks Mike. There’s a fact you are correct on!

        • jkt

          Steve:
          Ouch.

          How does it feel to be called out for being a greenie hypocrite .. ouch!😂
          Any Biden supporter deserves that..!
          Take your medicine 💊🤣

          The world is 🙃

          • Steve Otto(North Shore)

            Not sure if clown was being a clown or taking the piss!

    • mrtinkyholloway

      Yes. The West is now far more like China than China is like the West.

    • jedmo

      “This image is illegal in China”. Meanwhile Tarrant’s manifesto, is illegal in NZ. We are being gaslighted and infantilised by our government, for as long as it remains banned.

      • imalwaysright

        J
        Correct. And why hasn’t Tarrant been interviewed by a journalist?
        I want to hear, from him, why he did it

      • peterwn

        No. The fundamental issue is Tarrant must be denied a rostrum or channel to spout his vile stuff. That is one reason he is being held under supermax conditions.Two of the three branches of Government (executive and courts) have been unanimous on this right from when the tragic event occurred. If anyone thinks Tarrant’s manifesto should be un-banned, they are free to seek a judicial review of this in the courts. Very few people would want to see this foul and poisonous ‘manifesto’ which is why no one has bothered to commence judicial review proceedings..

        • Taieri

          Very few people would want to see this foul and poisonous ‘manifesto’
          ————-

          How do you know all that?
          Did you read this “manifesto” to determine that it is “poisonous” and “foul”?

          BTW: Hitler’s “Mein Kampf”, Lenin’s “Collected Works”, Stalin’s “Works” and many writings of Chairman Mao are easily available to all and sundry. As are the writings of Ted Kaczynski. Are Tarrant’s ravings any worse or more dangerous?

          • Master Mariner

            On a side note, It is interesting to note how many books are banned on Amazon.com.

            Regarding Tarrant, He picked NZ to carry out his acts due to lax Gun laws which must of included long term planning.
            Was not ex PM JA on the committee that proposed watering down Gun license requirements ?
            Regardless he was able to obtain online and vouched as “fit and proper” person by an online person to get.
            That’s my limited understanding.
            If so then you can understand why everyone else who has a Gun license was thrown under the bus to cover up for police ineptitude.

        • sirknz

          People should be allowed to read it, then they can decide whether or not they were told by the government of the day and the media.

          • imalwaysright

            Maybe it was embarrassing to the adern régime ?
            Don’t forget the whole of the NZ media signed up to the governments censorship rules around this. Thay all felt so important and virtuous about their voluntary neutering.
            It was downhill from there for the media, they became addicted to the government leash.

          • peterwn

            You mean in the same way as adults should be allowed to watch kiddy p*rn videos. The ‘manifesto’ and Tarrant’s bodycam footage were submitted to the Classification Office who ruled them ‘objectionable material’ meaning that to possess or deal with the material is an offence. Indeed a few people went to prison for possessing or dealing with copies of the bodycam footage. Jacinda Arden and her Ministers were not involved in the process. Indeed apart from offering sympathy to the victims and their families she and her Ministers just let the Police, Crown Law, Corrections and the Judiciary deal with the matter in accordance with the law and their duties. These agencies performed superbly (except perhaps for a few minor issues around the edges).
            As I said if anyone thinks the Classification Office did not fulfil its lawful duty when considering this material, they are free to seek Judicial Review of the Office’s decision. As for the tiny minority who seem desperate to see the ‘manifesto’, their prurient curiosities can go unsatisfied.

        • Steve Otto(North Shore)

          I can think of a better place to hold him.
          Just needs a box and shovel.

        • Chuck Bird

          I saw it before it was banned. It shows he is a greenie and not a right-winger.

          • imalwaysright

            Yes, if he was a right wing national supporter we would certainly have been advised ad nauseum of his politics and his manifesto.

        • Jake Dee

          All right then, judicial officials, police prosecutors, lawyers, academics and journalists have read it so why can’t you?
          Perhaps it could be said that THEY all had important jobs to do, and they needed to read it in order to understand what is going on.
          But can’t that be said of every thinking person?
          WE ALL have an important job to do, and that requires us to know what is really going on.

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        Helicopter Government?

      • Paulus

        Used to be called Mushrooming – kept in the dark and fed bullsh*t !

    • jkt

      International TankMan day!

  • artemisia

    Mr Hosking on law and order this morning, before the 7.30 news. Boy racers, Dunedin bus facility, New Plymouth businesses, Auckland downtown a no go area, retail crime. I would add drink driving. The Herald is reporting that Bay of Plenty police caught over 3,000 drivers over the limit just in their area last year. More than 50 a week.

    Tip of a lawlessness iceberg? Add in drug impaired and it’s more than the tip.

    Mr Hosking says prison is probably not the answer but it’s the best we’ve got and “Time is up on excuses”. Hard to argue with that.

    • Inandout

      art, then the hapless Coster was interviewed and we learnt nothing concrete except Andrew has fast motor bikes and covid is to blame for almost everything. Mike mentioned later that the Police Commissioner just does what he is told as he is a public servant. So those who say Coster is immune from government influence should face reality.

      • artemisia

        There was talk in the Coster interview about whether increasing the cost of alcohol would reduce crime. I grew up in a household with alcohol addiction – addicts don’t care if the cupboards are bare, the rent and power is not paid. Their priority is elsewhere.

        Increase the price, OK, but don’t forget the family victims – empty cupboards and often crime and violence.

        • riffer

          How about making alcohol an aggravating factor in sentencing?

        • Benedict Yu

          I don’t agree with increasing the price. However he has a point. Alcohol plays a part in much mayhem, especially family violence.

          Disclosure. I quit alcohol two months ago. I have no regrets.

          BTW I agree with your comment on alcohol addicts. You could restrict the sale of alcohol to two hours on Tuesdays only. The addicts would ensure they got all they needed for the week.

          • Grumpy Silver Top

            I know an ex-policeman who reckons we should be licensed to buy alcohol. I know that black-markets exist and grow under restrictions but maybe he has a point.

        • greybeard

          Prohibition in the USA did not stop people drinking, and it created a whole new crimewave by organised crime.
          Raising prices will simply result in more ram-raids and blatant thievery.
          What might work is the application of serious consequences for ALL crime, minor or major: no more wet bus tickets, no more second chances. Maximum sentences applied. You know, the things we have been requesting for years.

        • Paulus

          Interesting I have been on no Alcohol beer (medical grounds) for quite some time but just noticed on the back of the bottle in small print that they are all actually 0.5% Alcohol.
          No constable, I have not had any alcoholic drink.

          • Mike

            I think it only counts legally if above 1% ABV.

          • Benedict Yu

            0.5 percent is too low to notice. You would need to drink 10 beers in an hour to notice the equivalent of one alcoholic beer. Good luck doing that. 😅

    • cmm

      We don’t have enough accommodation for the crimewave. The crims know that a swamped system is a defeated system.

      We really need 4 x the number of people in prison than we have at present. Consider:
      * vast numbers of sentences that really should be imprisonment end up in Xbox leave. If those were all in prison as they should be then the prison numbers would double.
      * prisoners only serve around half their jail term on average. If they served the whole term, as they should, then the prison population would double.

      2 x 2 = 4.

      But, long term, maybe proper sentencing would reduce recidivism and prison numbers would ultimately come down.

      • kowtow

        Not only swamped but is a swamp.

        It’s a system that doesn’t want to hold criminals to account . The criminals know it and hold decent society in contempt .

      • Handyman

        Prisons are expensive because only the very serious offenders are sent there.
        What if we built more low security prisons with some work input for those currently on HD. It would look more like a rural raining institution.
        Any behaviour issues (fighting, escape etc) will see you immediately moved to the next level up in the jail system.

        • cmm

          “Prisons are expensive because only the very serious offenders are sent there.”

          No, prisons are expensive because they are run very expensively.

          It costs 4x as much to hold a prisoner as it does to put someone through university. That is ridiculous. Prisons should be run cheaper and partly self sustaining (eg. prison farms where the prisoners work hard and grow their own food, build accommodation blocks out of containers, etc).

          We have the highest recidivism rates in the OECD partly because prison is not a deterrent.

          • MCōs

            I talked to a guy who was locked up in Japan for overstaying his visa by something like ten years
            He said it was ultra cushy
            Japan has an incarceration rate about 1/5th of NZ
            Thailand has terrible prisons, yet their incarceration rate is more than twice ours
            So what does that tell you?

      • artemisia

        How about an actual construction apprenticeship scheme for those in prison. Teach them skills, maybe starting with container conversions inside the wire.

        There may be skills development already but apprenticeships? There are jobs outside the wire, even support to complete an apprenticeship started inside.

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        People like Special K never understood deterrence.
        Make the penalty so severe with no parole and the rotten bastards will just not commit crimes.

        • Handyman

          The more severe the prison system, the more judges will avoid sending people to prison.

          ONE of the purposes of confinement is not about the prisoner but about protecting society from further crimes of the prisoner. We acknowledge that for white collar crimes where it is about restitution and preventing the crim from being in a situation to steal again.

          The Victorians solved the problem of expensive jails by sending low level crims to the Australian penal colonies, not so much for punishment as to get them away from civilised society, which didn’t care if the crim was freed or not in Australia.

          Ironically, Australia now does the same thing by deporting crims to New Zealand.

          • mogg

            We could try the Norfolk Island cells where the prisoners had to stand up every time the tide came in to avoid drowning. This is detailed in “The Fatal Shore” by Robert Hughes. When they had served their time they were granted a plot of land, some on Kent Street in Central Sydney. Not bad eh?

          • MCōs

            Refer my comment above

      • Grumpy Silver Top

        Perhaps those who are genuinely “no threat to society’ should be on home detention. White collar crime, fraud, elderly etc. That would empty out a few cells.

        • AitchW

          When home detention was introduced we were assured that it would only ever be used for non violent offences.
          That went well didn’t it?

          • MCōs

            Got anything to back that up more than the occasional anecdote?

          • Pineapple Lumps

            Tauranga rapist got home d – is rape a non violent crime now?

    • backster

      Don’t worry Commissioner Cuddles has the answer, thanks to advice from his back room advisors. Increase the price of beer.

    • I remember when

      Is appeasem*nt the problem?
      Are the boy racers a prime example?
      At first councils and car clubs tried to suggest and offer alternatives but nothing was ever to their liking.
      So, with the passing of time their feeling of exercising their right has grown.
      Pre-teen ram raiding and retail crime shows how carefully the law must be applied to ensure the criminal element can’t exploit loopholes.

      • G152

        Spike the tyres.
        They have a car demo race around block the area in with trucks so noone gets out.
        Then deal with the race boys by taking their cars and wrecking them

      • Grumpy Silver Top

        Judith Collins went hard on boy racers with her crush their cars policy. Was that effective? (as long as it lasted?) Maybe there is a suitably powerful punishment for the ram raiders? Boot camp?

        • MCōs

          Real hard on boy racers
          Three cars were crushed

          • Mike

            Some on Kiwiblog even claimed no more needed to be crushed as rhe racers had been successfully deterred.

    • trout

      Coster has told us that there has been a serious uptick in youth crime in the last year after a gradual decline previously (he described a ‘hockey stick’ trend). The youth have responded to Labour’s ’empathy and soft touch’. They have learned there are no consequences for anti social behaviour.

      • artemisia

        They have learned they are entitled.

  • Simon

    The total number of excess deaths in 47 countries of the Western World was 3 098 456 from 1 January 2020 until 31 December 2022. Excess mortality was documented in 41 countries (87%) in 2020, 42 countries (89%) in 2021 and 43 countries (91%) in 2022. In 2020, the year of the COVID-19 pandemic onset and implementation of containment measures, records present 1 033 122 excess deaths (P-score 11.4%).

    Conclusions Excess mortality has remained high in the Western World for three consecutive years, despite the implementation of containment measures and COVID-19 vaccines. This raises serious concerns. Government leaders and policymakers need to thoroughly investigate underlying causes of persistent excess mortality.

    https://bmjpublichealth.bmj.com/content/2/1/e000282?rss=1

    Massive excess deaths which cant be hidden by govt.

    What is NZ’s covid vaccine death count? They will know of course but they will not say.

    Safe & effective death shot.

    • Benedict Yu

      Excess deaths were caused by COVID.

      https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2313661121

      However, even if you dismiss that conclusion, there is an indicator that proves, beyond doubt, that the COVID vaccine is not killing everyone. If it were, we would expect to see countries with high rates of vaccination experiencing high mortality rates, relative to countries with low vaccination rates.

      Of course, we see the exact opposite.

      https://www.nzdoctor.co.nz/article/undoctored/cumulative-pandemic-deaths-graph-more-effective-1000-words

      New Zealand has one of the highest, perhaps the highest, vaccination rates, certainly for the first two primary doses.

      Over the period of the vaccine roll out in New Zealand, and for the following two years, New Zealand had the lowest excess deaths amongst high and middle income countries.

      https://www.nzdoctor.co.nz/article/undoctored/cumulative-pandemic-deaths-graph-more-effective-1000-words

      In fact, excess deaths in New Zealand remained negative, ie fewer deaths than baseline, for 18 months following the vaccine roll out.

      There is no evidence that the vaccine mutates DNA or that it causes folk to drop dead of heart attacks, except in rare cases of adverse reactions. I cannot find any evidence that the incidence of serious and fatal adverse reactions from COVID vaccines is different from other vaccines.

      So, no it is not a death shot. I have had the two primary doses and four boosters. Of all the worries in my life, that does not feature. 😅

      • Grunter

        BY
        Why do you keep using an out-of-date cumulative deaths chart?

        Go to the MONTHLY excess deaths in NZ at Stats NZ for the real picture.

        We still have excess deaths around +15% each month and it is not COVID deaths.

      • Grunter

        6 jabs…..how many times have you had COVID?

        • Benedict Yu

          zero

      • mandk

        So why is the number of excess deaths in NZ now far higher than the number of deaths associated with Covid?

        On a related point, how much was the reduction in Covid-associated deaths the result of the vaxx and how much was it the result of better case management?

      • Taieri

        I have had the two primary doses and four boosters.
        ————–

        Have you had Covid?

        • Benedict Yu

          no

          • Taieri

            Neither had I with just two jabs + one booster.

            (My question above wasn’t sarcastic)

          • Pineapple Lumps

            Anecdotal stories aren’t relevant but here is what I’m seeing in my workplace and circles of friends.

            Both the vaccinated and unvaccinated are catching illnesses. The vaccinated seem more interested in testing for Covid, or those where workplaces have requested they stay home until they test clear. Most unvaccinated I know aren’t bothered with testing.

            Generally those vaccinated and confirmed with Covid are saying they are finding it much worse this time around.

            The Unvaccinated are generally taking less time off when sick.

            This is not confirmation that the Pfizer medical treatment works or doesn’t work. Nor that there are excess deaths or not. This is something our MOH should be getting researched. The great frustration is that there is no appetite to ask questions, research and collect and analyse data to understand if there are any issues or not. The drug companies aren’t interested in finding out the answers, Universities are unlikely to risk drug company funding by digging into this. So it falls to Government to make this happen. Let’s see what terms they put around the inquiry!

      • cmm

        ” I have had the two primary doses and four boosters”

        Granted it has probably done you little harm, but do you really think that has enhanced your life in any way?

        I have a heart condition. I had zero primary doses and zero boosters and of all the worries in my life Covid doesn’t feature either.

        Sure, Covid kills a few people. It has just replaced the work normally done by influenza: “The Old Man’s Friend”. If you substitute one way of dying with another then it really does not make any statistical difference.

        I am rather skeptical of any numbers using excess deaths because it is such a pointless measurement.

        We can expect a wave of excess deaths over the next decade or so due to the Baby Boomers’ demographic wave:
        * In the 1950s they were born.
        * In the 1960s there was a wave of them through school.
        * In the 1970s there was a wave of them in university, getting married etc…
        * …
        * And now there’s a wave of them falling off their perches.

        What is interesting are the more targeted statistics like deaths amongst younger people (eg. 30 to 50).

        • john1234

          Come on, be serious. COVID killed many, many orders of magnitude more people than vaccines.
          Yes, death counts were manipulated for political gain. Yes, vaccines were rushed in. Yes, politicians have taken advantage of a crisis and lied their arses off.
          But…
          The COVID killed a lot of mainly old and compromised people and vaccinations killed few people. As BY demonstrated, excess deaths are low in highly vaccinated countries.

          • mandk

            “COVID killed many, many orders of magnitude more people than vaccines.”

            But how do account for the fact that the number of excess deaths is now far higher than the number of deaths associated with COVID?

          • cmm

            “COVID killed many, many orders of magnitude more people than vaccines.”

            Is many, many, orders of magnitude maybe (I’ll be generous) 6 orders of magnitude? That would mean COVID killed one million times as many people as the vaccine did.

            I call bullsh*t.

            Covid death (and hospitalisations) have been counted very poorly. As a result very few people died FROM covid. Lots dies WITH covid.

            Last time I waas in hospital, there were 13 people in the cardiology ward with Covid – myself included. Not a single one was there because of covid. The vast majority had picked up covid in the hospital. In my case, I’d had covid a month earlier and the PCR testing just picked up covid

            So the hospital statistics are bullsh*t.

            On top of that, as I have said above, where it killed, Covid acted mainly as a substitute for influenza which carries away frail people. If a person dies from Covid instead of influenza that’s not really an added health risk.

            Over half the people that died with Covid in the first wave were in the Rosewood terminal care facility. They were sitting around waiting to die. If it had not been Covid they dies with, it would have been influenza.

          • Taieri

            The COVID killed a lot of mainly old and compromised people
            ————

            And how many of them died because of Covid-induced panic?

          • NothingLeft

            But how do account for the fact that the number of excess deaths is now far higher than the number of deaths associated with COVID?

            I believe the considered scientific rebuttal to that from the medical establishment is; Shut Up

        • pdm

          I have had two Aortic Valve replacements due to a genetic factor and am type 2 Diabetic.

          I have had the 2 primaries and 3 boosters – no after effects whatsoever.

          mrspdm has had the same and neither of us has had covid even though our 19 yr old grandson who lives with us has had it twice.

      • All_on_Red

        Four Boosters!
        That’s amazing
        I can understand it if someone was flying overseas a lot but wow
        After I got Covid (after my second jab) I have relied on Natural Immunity
        Fine so far

        • AitchW

          Yeah I had the first two shots then no more boosters.
          Now into week 2 of Covid, still quite unwell. My 90 year old mother in law who lives in our granny flat caught it not long after I did. She’s had all the boosters, the last one 6 weeks ago. Far less unwell than I am.
          One swallow may not make a summer, but when I recover I shall be seeking boosters when appropriate and available.

        • wsk12345

          Well I had no jabs and have had covid twice. Wouldn’t have known I had it if I’d not had others in the house had it. A sore throat for a day the first time and a running nose the second.

          God even my unvaxxed 82 yr old parents had no symptoms despite dad having several comorbidities.

      • JimBobJoe

        Ben, while I am not a Vax = death person, there is a problem here.

        And the problem is, in my view, no proper clinical testing of mRNA vaxs was done (effects over long time periods) and then no proper monitoring post jab was done to compensate for the lack of long term clinical trials.

        This natural leads to lots of questions.

        And its further complicated by the lack of a large unvaccinated population as a comparator across a large number of statistical sub populations (Age, Health status prior, Income levels as a proxy for quality of food intake, etc etc) – because of enforced or coerced vax mandates

        And there seems to be very limited Govt desire around the world to look into the issues related to excess death in a way that isnt constructed to validate safe and effective.

        • Benedict Yu

          Thanks for that.

          AFAIK the testing of the COVID vaccines was the same as would have been applied to other vaccines. It could be done faster because there was limitless money.

          I am happy to be corrected on this. My question is… Compared to the last large scale vaccine rollout.. the HPV vaccine in 2006, what testing steps were missed in the COVID vaccines? I mean precisely which steps?

          Unfortunately the COVID vaccines have become hopelessly polarising. I cannot recall a similar episode in my lifetime.

          • Grunter

            BY
            “Unfortunately the COVID vaccines have become hopelessly polarising. I cannot recall a similar episode in my lifetime.”

            We agree on that point. So to regain trust why don’t we simply have a full and open inquiry into everything? Why hide, delay, and censor? Why did they legally gag every GP in NZ? Why did they give Pfizer legal immunity? Why don’t they admit that MONTHLY excess deaths continue to track around +15% years after a virus took out some vagile eldery people a year or 2 early?

          • Handyman

            Kudos Benedict for wading into this discussion, maintaining dignity and politeness.
            Sadly, most people interested in the subject have moved into tribal groups in opposition to each other rather than joining together as joint seekers of truth.

            We are almost at the point now I have been waiting for. That is, moving out of analysis by anecdote and accessing research in journal papers corrected for xyz.

          • Inandout

            BY,
            ‘A new drug is first studied in the laboratory. If it looks promising, it is carefully studied in people. It may be then licensed if the trial shows that it works well and doesn’t cause too many side effects. You may hear this process called ‘from bench to bedside’.

            There is no typical length of time it takes for a drug to be tested and approved. It might take 10 to 15 years or more to complete all 3 phases of clinical trials before the licensing stage. But this time span varies a lot.’
            The Covid vaccine was rushed and ‘limitless money’ means nothing, zilch. As the cheese ad says ‘good things take time’ and for new drugs a very long time. Serious questions must be asked as the alternative would be that we trusted the ‘experts’.

          • artemisia

            Gaza?

          • NothingLeft

            We are almost at the point now I have been waiting for. That is, moving out of analysis by anecdote and accessing research in journal papers corrected for xyz.

            Max Planck: ” Science advances one funeral at a time”, or this case more like ten million unnecessary funerals.

          • JimBobJoe

            “AFAIK the testing of the COVID vaccines was the same as would have been applied to other vaccines. It could be done faster because there was limitless money.”

            Really? No long run trials concern me… particularly when the CDC says can take 10 to 15 years to prove a new vaccine…

            https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/basics/test-approve.html

            Re the HPV Vaccine: note the statement of ‘years’ of strict safety testing

            Info at this link:
            https://www.cdc.gov/hpv/hcp/vaccine-safety-data.html

            “Each HPV vaccine—9-valent HPV vaccine (Gardasil® 9), quadrivalent HPV vaccine (Gardasil®), and bivalent HPV vaccine (Cervarix®)—went through years of strict safety testing before the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) licensed it. Each vaccine was found to be safe and effective in clinical trials.”

            mRNA as a platform is unproven as a delivery mechanism for vaccines. Many Biotech companies gave up on mRNA as a delivery mechanism as the could not get the tech to deliver the payload to the place they want and only the place they wanted.

          • JimBobJoe

            mRNA delivery problems are mentioned in this STAT health news site coverage of Moderna (mostly focused on Moderna’s supposed toxic business culture…)

            https://www.statnews.com/2016/09/13/moderna-therapeutics-biotech-mrna/

            “Delivery — actually getting RNA into cells — has long bedeviled the whole field. On their own, RNA molecules have a hard time reaching their targets. They work better if they’re wrapped up in a delivery mechanism, such as nanoparticles made of lipids. But those nanoparticles can lead to dangerous side effects, especially if a patient has to take repeated doses over months or years.

            Novartis abandoned the related realm of RNA interference over concerns about toxicity, as did Merck and Roche.”

            “Moderna’s most advanced competitors, CureVac and BioNTech, have acknowledged the same challenge with mRNA. Each is principally focused on vaccines for infectious disease and cancer, which the companies believe can be attacked with just a few doses of mRNA. And each has already tested its technology on hundreds of patients.

            “I would say that mRNA is better suited for diseases where treatment for short duration is sufficiently curative, so the toxicities caused by delivery materials are less likely to occur,” said Katalin Karikó, a pioneer in the field who serves as a vice president at BioNTech.”

          • Pineapple Lumps

            “I am happy to be corrected on this”

            Ben you are wrong and I have made you aware of this before. Either you don’t read the comments or you are choosing to ignore them.

            Medsafe was not able to approve the Pfizer medical treatment due to insufficient safety data. The approval was escalated to a small, as yet anonymous committee, that then made the decision.

            This is clearly not the process expected to be used for sign-off of medical treatments, vaccines or otherwise. Are you prepared to acknowledge that?

            Your experience with 6 doses are of no more consequence than any other individual’s experiences. What is significant and as yet remains unexplained are the huge variations in adverse events between different batches of the Pfizer treatment. The question should be why? Is it due to highly variable production or supply chain quality issues, or huge differences in administration ie aspiration v non-aspiration, or is it the people who the batches were administered too more vulnerable? Who is looking into this on behalf of the consumer?

            There are lots of aspects of the Pfizer treatment rollout that are abnormal and do not meet the expectations for how a medical treatment rollout would normally be done. It is definitely not the case that they just fast tracked the process by spending much more money!

      • MCōs

        We know that approx half NZ medical professionals who were mandated to get covid vaccines were exempted.
        What I’d like to know was there a higher death rate among those who were vaccinated?
        It would be difficult to covered up 500 deaths or whatever There’s too many people would know about such data for it to be kept secret.
        Some of the more wild claims I’ve read was 20% or so of vaccinated people have subsequently died

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        Two jabs and got covid once. That was enough. Safe and effective my left tit.

  • Colinxy

    I found DPF’s post yesterday on Ali Khamenei’s tweet intriguing. Khamenei used a Marxist phrase:

    “…you are standing on the right side of history.”

    I did not believe Khamenei was an Islamic Socialist – and he’s not.

    However, in the 1970s, the Islamists were bedfellows with Marxists – to bring about the Revolution (the enemy of my enemy and all that). And during one of his stints in prison, Khamenei become friends with the Marxist Houshang Asadi.

    So, while he may not be a Marxist, he was definitely exposed to Marxist ideas and using such a phrase will no doubt appeal to Western Marxists.

    Putting some thoughts about Queers for Palestine. I suspect people here are conflating hom*osexuality with Queer.

    L: Lesbian: Female hom*osexual
    G: Gay: Male hom*osexual
    B: Bisexual: attracted to either sex.
    T: Transexual: wants to be the other sex.
    Q: Queer: “an identity without an essence” – David Halperin
    +: a topic for another day, but + is short for Plus with the first letter being P…

    Why have ‘Q’ as a separate category amongst the alphabet folk? That’s because it is different. Queers may or may not be hom*osexual. They are a form of Neo Marxism, and this is easily discerned from their founders like Gayle Rubin, Judith Butler etc. Queers are the ones who push for “gender is on a spectrum” and like to play with words ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ so people conflate the two. Queers want to obliterate the sex binary and consider “stability” to be Bourgeoisie; believe it or not, they are against hom*osexual marriage since they consider it stabilising – and will therefore be an obstacle for their true goal – Revolution.

    And Revolution is key. A very important Marxist maxim is “The issue isn’t the issue. The real issue is Revolution”. Queers for Palestine have no love for the competing religion known as Islam. What they want is Revolution – by any means necessary. And once they have their Revolution, they want another (and another and another ad infinitum).

    And Neo Marxists fear stability – the working class became stable and therefore not Revolutionary. This was identified by Herbert Marcuse, but “perfected” in language until Paulo Friere. (It’s also there with Lenin and Mao too but has become more front of mind with modern Marxists than their forbears, but I digress).

    As I started with, Marxists and Islamists united in Iran to bring about a Revolution. And this will be the goal in Palestine. Marxists always want a Revolution and Neo Marxists want there to be perpetual Revolution – only then will there be the “end of history” – Utopia (and then you will be judged on whether you were on the right or wrong side of history).

    • Jake Dee

      “The Right Side of History” is not a Marxist concept. Or at least, if it is now then it was a Protestant Christian one before it was picked up the Marxists
      As I mentioned in the “Harvard Finally gets it’ debate
      “The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends towards justice”
      Was written by the Unitarian preacher and Harvard graduate Theodore Parker in the 1830s before it was used by Baptist minister the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jnr. in the 1960s and then by Barak Obama (another Harvard graduate) in the 2010s.

      That “moral arc” of history is exactly the “right side of history”. Personally, I find the whole concept of a moral or right side of history to be absurd. But if you want to hit out at Marxists or Islamists for using it then you should be honest enough to point out that the Protestants had it first.

    • Gravelroad

      Smugness personified.
      Look at me, look at me, look at me!
      How cool am I.
      I guess he will have a lucrative “law practice” giving advice to gang members on how to get away with robbing and bashing dumb people.

      • riffer

        If he’s psychopathic I would have thought a career in business was a beter fit.

        • Swifty

          No, Green or Maori Party MP or Uni lecturer or professor in any of the ‘studies’ studies.

          Take your pick.

      • Jack5

        The real criminality looks to be in the university squandering taxpayer-provided resources in educating this criminal.

        Plenty of ambitious kids can’t afford to go to university. This teaches them that imprisonment is a way to get there.

    • Graham Sharpe

      Note the reporter Belinda Feek is an “Open Justice ” reporter. i.e. she is an advocate not a dispassionate reporter. So the article is extremely sympathetic to an arrogant, smart arse POS who has played the system like a triangle. A spell in custody would do him some good. No thought given to the car owners who were his victims. And it’s a dollar to a knob of goat sh*t that there are a lot more vehicles than those on the charge sheet.

    • NothingLeft

      what’s the point in getting a law degree when your low morals will prevent you getting a practising certificate? Is it just so he knows better how to screw people over and get away with it?

      • Taieri

        Is that why Greg Newbold became a criminologist? To learn how to better screw people over and get away with it?

    • NeverMindTheBollocks

      I see he’s a Ford fan (plus a Mazda by mistake)

  • Steve Otto(North Shore)

    “A Florida appeals court received more than 1,000 complaints about the federal judge presiding over Donald Trump’s classified documents case within just a week last month.”
    “Many of the complaints have demanded Trump-appointed US District Judge Aileen Cannon remove herself from the Mar-a-Lago case.”
    The cheek of it from the left after the sh*t in New York. Merchan and the jury all Democrats! The other Judge Engoron has no Jury (neither side asked for one he said.
    The complaints “appear to be part of an orchestrated campaign,” No sh*t!
    These Democrats are unbelievable!

    https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/other/there-were-so-many-complaints-against-the-judge-in-trump-s-mar-a-lago-case-that-the-court-quit-taking-them/ar-BB1nC2kz?

    • jkt

      Good point.

      How can democrats be allowed to serve on the Trump criminal case jury, they cannot be considered Trump peers.

      American justice stinks!! Right?

      • All_on_Red

        I think the problem is more about Peer pressure in the Community
        Jurors get doxxed and their life made hell
        Just look at Hunter Bidens trial in Wilmington
        The first day and five Jurors didn’t turn up

        • jkt

          And that is exactly the problem.
          Liberty needs the protection of justice.

          “Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, ….. neither is safe.” Edmund Burke.

          Without justice, courage is weak.

        • Paulus

          And remember the Jurors have all been offered huge sums of money for their stories about the criminal Trump that they found guilty(of what offence) ?

          • jkt

            The juror that knows the offence gets the first prize.🏆

    • lifesgood

      She’s always been a lefty loon. Had a privileged childhood so thinks her opinions are important. Only bulldozed down a few houses to build her walled mansion. Hypocrite.

    • softail 1450

      MP, How dare you take the piss MP, anyone with working eyes can see the Native heritage in Kuia Lawless ,btw why is the tiki always aligned with the ground ? are they perpetually asleep ?

      • Steve Otto(North Shore)

        Lucy Ryan.

    • Steve Otto(North Shore)

      See the size of my Tiki e-hoa?

    • mogg

      Very much an Airhead and just a little bit childish.

  • Nukuleka

    Joe Biden must really be worried about his reelection chances when, after 3 years of denying there was a crisis on the southern border, he belatedly enacts legislation to slow down the arrival of the illegals. But is it too little, too late to prevent Trump’s seemingly inevitable triumph in November?

    • cmm

      “Joe Biden must really be worried …”

      Naah, his handlers are.

      Joe himself lives in a nice little world in his own head.

      • john1234

        And if he had any worries an ice cream will make them vanish.

    • RoboRob

      An incredibly cynical move to do this 5 mths out from an election when he has spent the last 3.5yrs saying he doesn’t have the power to do anything.

    • MCōs

      The President cannot enact legislation. That’s up to Congress, which consists of the House of Representatives dominated by the Republicans, and the Senate controlled by the Democrats.
      If those two can’t cooperate nothing happens, which is what has happened on this issue

      • NothingLeft

        The US president has executive control over military and border. He can at the stroke of a pen require military to stop border crossers. Amazing how after 3 years of essentially no border policing (having cancelled all Trump executive orders relating to border controls), with an election looming Biden suddenly decides to stiffen up border control in response to voter outrage – without any new legislation being passed.

        Claims that it was Republican intransigence and unwillingness to give Democrats their pork barrelling wishlist that was the cause of the huge flood of illegal border crossers has been demonstrated to have been complete bollocks. As informed people always knew, it was always about (ironically undemocratic) Democrats wanting to illegally grow their voting base.

  • lifesgood

    I won’t go up Queen St until they clear out the rough sleepers, beggars and druggies. Last time I walked up there, in broad daylight, it was scary, getting accosted several times. Also, Quay St has become a haven for rough sleepers, right by the cruise ship terminal where our much needed tourists arrive. I am ashamed of my city.

    • cmm

      It astounds me that cruise ships would want to dock in Auckland. What’s the attraction?

      Surely if you’re travelling you would want to see different things. Why go to Auckland, especially down town, which is pretty much just another generic city?

      I can understand them offloading in Lyttleton for a zoom around the Canterbury plains. Or Tauranga to see Rotorua etc. But Queen St?

      • MCōs

        They’ve got all day which is enough time to go to Hobbiton or Waiheke Is or other stuff tourists seem to like.

        • Flossie

          Wouldn’t a visit to Hobbiton (aka Matamata) require 5 or 6 hours in a bus? Not really what I’d want to do.

          • MCōs

            Hobbiton is about 16km from Matamata

          • All_on_Red

            It would be 5+ hours there and back
            Take the Expressway to Karapiro and turn left at the Mobil Service Station.
            Long Day for bugger all really

    • MCōs

      We rarely walk along Queens St because there’s nothing there of interest. The people lounging round asking for money don’t bother me. I just say Sorry, mate and keep walking
      It’s the car window washers I don’t like.
      When I was in Jakarta I went somewhere with a guy in the office and we were harassed a couple of times. He said if you don’t give them some money they’ll scratch the car

      • waikatosinger

        Queen street is a dark and dingy mile of closed malls, health supplement shops and vape stores. I don’t see it coming back.

      • MCōs

        We were driving along a road, the equivalent of say Great South Rd, and came to a detour down a side road. About 400m there was a U-turn manned by some guys directing traffic & collecting money and back to the main road and off again.
        There’s a good idea if you’re got someone hanging round the house who won’t get off their arse; your husband for example.

    • mandk

      It’s because no one bothers with sub-editing anymore.
      People who used to be sub-editors are now bait-click operatives.

    • Maggy Wassilieff

      The spelling varies in the article…

      It’s only correct in the early paragraphs…then it reverts to force majure again.

      One often sees a force majure clause work out with domestic flights in New Zealand, as airlines are not obligated to provide refunds or compensation if a flight is delayed or cancelled for reasons outside its control (AKA a force majure).
      etc, etc….

  • cmm

    “Unacceptable inequities for Maori”

    Oh bullsh*t.
    Everyone is struggling to access mental health services. If anything it is easier for Maori due to all the dozens of special Maori-oriented NGOs.

    “Māori make up 29.1 per cent of those using specialist mental health and addiction services”. But they only make up less than 20% of the population. So clearly they are able to access mental health services at around 1.6x the rate that non-Maori do.

    So if they access MH services at 1.6x the rate, how can any legitimate report find that they have less access to these services?

    More bullsh*t activism…

    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/kahu/mental-health-report-faults-unacceptable-inequities-for-maori/R2EAIQEVIVGZJJTQOTXG4F7VCE/

  • Rusty

    I wonder if Dr Ashley Bloomfield and his expert team during covid are following proceedings in America with Dr Fauci being grilled by lawmakers over his handling of covid?

    • peterwn

      It is so easy to be critical in hindsight. Drs Fauci and Bloomfield handled the situation the best they could with the information available at the time.
      A horrid NZ scenario which fortunately did not eventuate was that hospital ED and Critical Care facilities would be overwhelmed with Covid cases with a dire shortage of staff and equipment (eg ventilators) to deal with it. If that scenario had eventuated then their decision making and actions would be coming under far more scrutiny today.

      • cmm

        ” If that scenario had eventuated ”
        It was all fictional hype to make people fearful.

        • jkt

          I sure as hell was alarmed by the pictures that reached our shores of those hospitalised and dying in Italy.

          I can understand my own level of alarm at that time. But the actions of the experts over time has been a real eye-opener for me.

        • MCōs

          An Italian/French family normally domiciled in Onehunga, who are family friends were over in Milan in early 2020 when covid-19 struck in that area.
          They cut their time short and managed to get back to NZ in the nick of time. Large numbers were dying and would die in that part of Italy
          As you will recall tests were scarce at that time, vaccines were non existent and as now there was no cure. Furthermore the early strains were brutal
          It was no fictional hype
          https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7248465/

      • waikatosinger

        Fauci didn’t come to this with clean hands. He funded the Wuhan lab. He was the wrong man for the job.

      • Hugh Jarse

        Peterwn, I agree. I think people forget the impact the original Covid had on the northern hemisphere medical systems including casualties within the medical staff, elderly And the public. Our health system was woefully underprepared for the pandemic, our PPE supplies were minimal. The initial lockdown was probably badly needed to buy time for the health system to try and gear up. Our PM was much more focussed on her Pacific tour and the mosque shootings anniversary global news coverage than a pesky little pandemic.

        My issues with the pandemic response relate to the political management of it not so much the medical management and the total lack of continual improvement in systems and processes over each outbreak. It was just the same old same old each time. Most of the calls were the PM’s and she made those on the hoof on many occasions leaving officials to wonder how they implement the commands from on high. A proper Commission of Inquiry will point directly to where the bad decisions emanated from I suspect.

        • greybeard

          One of the worst things done by Jacinda’s govt was to immediately scrap the already-prepared ( & signed-off) Pandemic Plan, in favour of their own ideological response.

    • Grunter

      Fauci is clearly an evil, corrupt bugger. I can’t think of anything he didn’t lie about (masks, lockdowns, virus origins, jabs, stay 6 feet apart).

      We need to put Hipkins on the stand as well and make him wet his pants as he admits to his repeated lies.

    • Master Mariner

      I am Rusty, As the scab is slowly pulled away.
      Dr Fauci Aid, Dr Moran really opened it up prior.

      • Rusty

        @Master — I agree.

  • Swifty

    With Kidman at the helm I have and had no confidence her research group wouldn’t be just another taxpayer-funded politicised lefty advocacy factory.

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/518667/terrorism-and-violent-extremism-research-funding-cut-by-two-thirds

    I maintain that the single greatest homegrown threat to our long term interests is our continuing to allow Muslim immigration.

    An unpopular notion I accept and one that will attract all the usual rebuttals the main one being “oh but our Muslims are peaceful and assimilate well.”

    Unfortunately exactly the same thing has been said in the UK, the US, whole swathes of Western Europe and over decades and just look at where they are now.

    We are heading in exactly the same direction and I confidently predict we will have growing pockets of Islamism and resultant calls for sharia-compliant laws, sharia education and anti-blasphemy laws to silence any and all opposition to Islamic interests – and with increasing numbers of Islamic-inspired violent incidents ostensibly in response to our government’s ‘oppression’ or foreign policy.

    Just you watch.

    • cmm

      The more deadly co*cktail is mixing the Islamic values with the increasingly polarised young hot-head Maori who are full of grievances.

      Whether or not the grievance is justified doesn’t matter. They feel aggrieved and they feel entitled to extract payback. At what point will they act?

      • Paulus

        Are not many Maori in prison creating themselves to Mohammed ?
        Has been in for a while I understand.

        • Jack5

          Muslims make up 18 per cent of prisoners in England and Wales, compared with their proportion of the total population at 6.5 per cent.

          Reporting this on March 19, the Telegraph says 19.9 per cent of the Muslim prisoners were White, compared with 7.8 per cent of the general Muslim population.

          Reports have been highlighting concerns that gangs in some jails are ordering prisoners to become Muslims or face violence.

          The Telegraph says a report two years ago by Jonathan Hall KC, Britain’s independent reviewer of terror legislation, revealed that Muslim terrorists had been able to seize control of prison wings and set up sharia courts behind bars because prison staff were so concerned about being accused of racism.

          In January of this year, Hall called for new legislation to control Islamic chatbots using artificial intelligence to recruit violent terrorists.

          Hall said that only human beings could commit terrorism offences, and it was hard to identify a person who could in law be responsible for chatbot-generated statements that encouraged terrorism.

          This is paywalled, but you may be able to read it if you sign up for a free Telegraph account:

          https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/19/one-five-muslim-prisoners-white-islamic-gangs-conversions/

    • Blog-aholic

      I am sure some Labour MP’s support the ethos of TPM.
      The question is whether Labour will be seen to support TPM or will they ultimately have to decide which side of the division fence they wish the public of NZ to see them on?

    • rouppe

      Ginny Anderson was asked this question this morning by Mike Hosking.

      She waffled.

    • Wayne Mapp

      Labour will do neither. Their Māori MP’s will certainly support all the initiatives of the last government. When next in government they will reinstate them all, plus go a bit further. But they will let TPM run their own arguments, pretty much without comment.

      The next Left government will be tripartite just like the current one. TPM and the Greens will want more than the initiatives of the last Labour government. For instance Te Reo as a mandatory subject in primary school.

      Hence why I said yesterday that there will some sort of Māori elective assembly that will be responsible for Whanau Ora, a reinstated Maori Health Authority, the Kohanga and other Maori education. There is probably $5 billion public money going on these things.

      Such as assembly is a pretty obvious expectation from TPM and the Greens. I imagine such an assembly would be elected on the basis of the Maori electoral roll.

      • Taieri

        It pains me to admit that your predictions may be quite accurate Wayne…

      • cmm

        The next Left government?

        We already have a Left government at the moment.

        I think you mean the next Far Left government.

      • Hugh Jarse

        Yes Wayne, no one should be under any allusions that when Labour get in again they will pick up where they left off this time.

      • Paulus

        I am seeing very recently that it appears all schools have new road sign stating Kura and School underneath.

          • waikatosinger

            Degreening is the more urgent problem. I’m OK with a few maori signs. I just want them to stop wasting money building bike lanes for non-existent bikes and subsidising the construction of “in lane” bus stops.

      • mogg

        Yes but with TPM in the potential coalition Labour will make themselves unelectable.

        • Suze Wainwright

          Heh, Audrey Young was opining that very thing in the weekend. Maybe Audrey’s just getting conservative in her old(er) age…

      • jkt

        “Elective assembly of Maori” …. you mean they are going to replace John Tamihere!

        Imagine the pressure under which that poor man must be!

      • artemisia

        What about eligibility to be on the Maori roll but on the general roll? That’s a significant known number. We can be sure it will be required in the mix somewhere.

      • BananaLlama

        Then it will be a short Labour government like the last one and i doubt there will be anymore pandemics to save them from a thrashing so i wouldn’t worry about it, easy meat for the Right to campaign on and get re-elected.

        • BananaLlama

          Poor Mr Down ticker here is another fact for you.
          Race based politics are about as popular in this country as Covid mandates, the Maori party wouldn’t even make it past the 5% threshold without special treatment from the Maori roll.

          • MCōs

            The Maori party hasn’t made it passed 5% at any time. They rely on electorate seats and they ain’t going anywhere
            Apart from that if the Maori seats were deleted those who were on the Maori roll could still vote for the Māori Party

          • Mike

            If the Maori seats were abolished, it seems likely that a Maori party of some kind would receive a higher percentage of the vote.

      • Pineapple Lumps

        So Wayne, do you support a Māori parliament and/or a Māori assembly?

  • softail 1450

    LOL, A group of jandal wearing Hootis strike the Nuclear powered aircraft carrier Eisenhower with a couple of improvised rockets and the ship retreats at full speed ,to make matters worse the captain sends images of the area supposedly struck denying the strike completely, unfortunately some wag has proved beyond doubt that the images were weeks old.
    And of course Pedo Joes administration have stopped Scott Ritter from travelling to Russia along with Napolitano and confiscated his passports ,America is officially a banana republic.

    • cmm

      Weaponry goes through waves.

      At one stage, the tank was the king of the battlefield. A tank only feared other tanks and anti-talk artillery. Now it’s the biggest death trap/target and an infantryman can easily take one out from a safe distance.

      At one stage aircraft carriers were completely dominant. They are basically a floating military airbase.

      Now cruise missiles/attack drones are so cheap to make and so numerous that aircraft carriers are targets too.

      • David Garrett

        cmm: In WW II aircraft carriers were also vulnerable to torpedoes fired from subs.

        • cmm

          Yes, but to a far lesser extent.

          Aircraft carriers (then and now) move with screens of smaller ships – well equipped for anti-submarine warfare.

          A sub’s odds attacking a carrier battle group are far from excellent. Most likely result is that a determined attack will see the sub lost with maybe some damage to a screening ship and the carrier intact.

          But with drones and cruise missiles who cares? Fire 100 and if 1 gets through then Allah is great. They cost almost nothing, no lives are risked (well not lives of consequence) and very little skill is required to operate them.

          • Mike

            The Interfet mission to East Timor was with reluctant agreement from the Indonesians, but there were plenty of NZ, Aussie and US units nearby in case of escalation.

          • Jack5

            Mike, without American help, Indonesia would have been a big opponent for Australia and NZ.

            From current-day figures at Global Firepower:

            Indonesia: 400,000 on active duty in defence forces, with 400,000 reservists; 313 tanks; military aircraft 474.

            Australia: 57,350 active in defence forces, 32,050 reservists; 59 tanks; military aircraft 325.

      • mogg

        Not too fast AI chips and radar are changing everything as we speak. We know that more than 300 missiles and bombs failed to get through Israeli defences, at the same time a few Israeli bombers were able to put Iranian airbase out of action.

        • cmm

          I think far too much hype is being made of the AI chips.

          The regular chips and other componentry will do the job fine.

          25 years ago a drone, or equivalent, would have needed relatively sophisticated GPS, inertial measurement units, communications infrastructure and such. Now $100 of hobby grade kit will outperform that many times over.

        • Grunter

          All the slow flying drones got knocked out of the sky, 100% hit rate reported.

          What is not so widely reported (by MSM) is that all of the Iranian hypersonic missiles got through – 100% success rate reported.

          So, just like ICBM’s, hypersonic missiles, have a very high success rate no matter who fires them. Shooting one down is like shooting a bullet with a bullet.

        • Ra Henare

          Mogg
          Just a small correction/perspective as you don’t seem to understand military tactics.

          . Over 300 low grade missiles were use to draw out Israeli defense, while 15 missile accurately hit their target.
          https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/14/iran-attacks-israel-with-over-300-drones-missiles-what-you-need-to-know

          This Iranian action was telegraphed to the USA/Israel 14 days before the event and was a response to Israel attacking the Iranian Embassy in Damascus.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_Iranian_strikes_against_Israel

          The Israelis then launched from Iranian Soil drones which damages an Iranian Radar Installation or maybe one air launched missile.
          No Bombs No airbase.

          https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68853402

          Not sure where you drew your conclusion that.
          At the same time Israeli Bombers put an airbase out of action.

          A reference would be nice.

      • Grunter

        Every ‘war game’ played out between Iran and the USA results in all US aircraft carriers being sunk in the first day of the mock war. Hypersonics fired from Iran at nearby US ships are simply sitting ducks.

        • Grunter

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002

          Look it up ‘The Millenium Challenge”

          The games grew to encompass 13,500 service members participating from 17 different simulation locations across several training sites. Within a matter of days the red team (Iran) sunk 19 blue team’s (USA) ships and rendered its carrier battle group ineffective.

          • All_on_Red

            Oh for goodness sake
            It was done in 2002 and it is based around the US invading Iran with a shore landing.
            So the Carriers were really close. And no Patriots or Iron Dome or the Israeli Arrow system
            Or Sea Whizz
            No one is going to invade Iran (or China)
            The US would stand their Carriers off over a thousand miles away and blow the place to pieces (China, they will set up a blockade even further away and starve the place)
            Irans so called Hypersonics only have a 900 mile range and their capability is, well, dubious.
            In contrast Israel destroyed the S400 site at the airfield guarding Irans nuclear facility easily.
            Iran couldnt stop it.
            Its like the other day you said Russia sent a warship with ‘hundreds of hypersonics on board’ to the Gulf.
            Their Warships cant carry that many…
            And Israel is about to put into action their Laser Defence system
            Cheap, fast and very accurate
            WAhttps://allisrael.com/israeli-game-changer-iron-beam-defense-system-expected-to-be-operational-in-2024FM

          • Grunter

            AOR – How’s that ‘Iron Dome’ handling the Hezbollah missiles? Northern Israel is a mess (as predicted).

            You make out that ‘The West’ is an untouchable force that can never be destroyed or lost in a war.

            But hey – keep following the US Neocon propaganda stream from The Institute of the Study of War (you know, the ones making all the weapons and money). They are bloody good at winning the PR campaign and justifying even more weapons and death.

    • virtualmark

      There’s no sign or evidence that the Ike was hit with anything. As far as I can tell it’s a made up story.

      As for your second paragraph … wow. Scott Ritter has *twice* been done for soliciting sex from under-age girls, so there’s your pedo. And Ritter is in Russia at the moment, and Solovyov had him on his show in the last 24 hours.

  • Maggie Pie

    ‘PRIDE MONTH NZ’ is upon us.
    They begin their nationwide ‘School Week’ campaign on the 17th, with the stated aim
    of increasing awareness of LGBTQI+ in the community.

    And it’s happening everywhere….

    https://x.com/celinevmachine_/status/1795622025010266347

    “There is no place for a ‘QUEER CLUB’ in any school, let alone a PRIMARY SCHOOL!” 🙁

    • Taieri

      increasing awareness of LGBTQI+ in the community
      ————

      When will the “increased awareness” need no further increasing I wonder…

      • sirknz

        Like an eclipse, when it reaches totality.

    • mogg

      Can we have a non pride month?

      • Jack5

        First the meaning of the word “gay” changed. Now the connotations of “pride”?

    • Gravelroad

      Are these Council people accurately promoting and representing the opinions and wishes of the majority of their local ratepayers?
      Or is it a case of cynically advocating for race based wards in the expectation of more public money coming their way if they do?

      • artemisia

        Not being loudly and often called racist works these days.

  • Ghost

    Someone got hungry. Also he was on shorty for just over 1 month, yet it seems to be thrown around in every article about him

    A Kiwi pro-Palestine activist has ended his 19-day hunger strike, saying his “health is being affected”.

    Will Alexander, a former Shortland Street actor, said he’s been contacted by “the people of Palestine” who supported his strike.

    Article

    • Arthur Fleck

      Well yes, when you stop eating your health tends to be affected, what exactly was he expecting?

      What a complete bell-end.

    • Gravelroad

      Great.
      How fantastic that an actor on a modest Tv show in a small country went on a hunger strike.
      Good on him.
      Now he might get a bit-part on another show about how to treat people whose health has been impacted by starvation.
      The makers of the programme could sell it to the people of Palestine as an activist’s documentary.

      • mandk

        I think he would be better suited to a programme about people whose health has been affected by their wokeness.

        Or perhaps a programme about people whose health has been affected by their stupidity.

    • Flossie

      Seriously what did he imagine would happen to your health if you don’t eat?! I’m sure his carrying on hasn’t made a blind bit of difference to the Gaza situation. Got his name in the news a bit is all.

      • Libertarians are right

        I think you’ll find that was the point – out of work bit part actor gets name recognition.
        What a parasitic disgusting thing to do – profiteering off the deaths of innocent people.

    • cmm

      His demands were brainless.

      He was insisting that NZ troops pull out of their involvement in Gaza.

      They are 2500km away from Gaza, engaged with the campaign against the Houthies.

      It’s like confusing Sydney with Auckland.

  • Paulus

    The difference in Gaza is that many do not get any food as Hamas stops the lorries, and takes it all into their warehouses.
    Keeps the hungry masses screaming against the world.
    In a new Palestine Hamas will rule the lot anyway as they are Iran, and other Muslim supported..
    Can often be seen of our TVs

    • MCōs

      I don’t know where you get your information from
      However
      There’s no denying times of deprivation bring out the worst (& best) in people and nations
      There are numerous examples throughout history of might is right; rationalized in a thousand different ways when held to account

    • Ra Henare

      A reference regarding your OPINION would be lovely

  • Keith White

    The short story: the numbers of people quoted died from any cause above and beyond what would normally be expected for any given week or month between January 2020 and December 2022 and 47 countries in Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand. In 2020, beer in which the pandemic started, excess deaths were 11.5% higher than expected. In 2021, the year in which vaccines were added to the containment measures, a total of 14% higher excess deaths was measured. At 2022, the year in which most containment measures were lifted back over 19 vaccines were continued, 10% excess deaths were recorded.

    Q. E. effing. D.

    Oh you illegitimate offspring of putrefaction incarnate, we effing well did warn you, we told you it would happen, we documented it was happening, and we are telling you now it did happen although you keep saying “studies have been discredited”. How many more studies do you intend to discredit before you accept the evidence of your-apparently-lying-to-yourselves eyes?

    “Researchers from The Netherlands analysed data from 47 Western countries and discovered there had been more than three million excess deaths since 2020, with the trend continuing despite the rollout of vaccines and containment measures.”

    Yeah.

    “During the pandemic, it was emphasised by politicians and the media on a daily basis that every Covid-19 death mattered and every life deserved protection through containment measures and Covid-19 vaccines.”

    But it seems the same does not apply to every death from the jab, right?

    “Across Europe, the US and Australia and New Zealand there have been more than one million excess deaths in 2020, at the height of the pandemic, but also 1.2 million in 2021 and 800,000 and 2022 after measures were implemented.”

    ‘Measures were implemented’. A bit like saying – and I am going full Godwin here, “the ruling National Socialist Workers’ Party decided to concentrate certain groups in the population into work camps.”

    In other words, the deaths kept rising when people were not dying with Covid but were dying from the antiCovid JODAD.

    “German researchers have pointed out that the onset of excess mortality in early 2021 in the country coincided with the rollout of vaccines…”

    Yep. It didn’t coincide with an increase in the infection, it coincided with an increase of the jab that was supposed to protect you and stop you transmitting it.

    “NHS England data shows that per 100,000 people the cancer incidence was 521 in the pre-lockdown year, then fell to 456 in 2020/2021 suggesting around 45,000 cancers were missed in the first pandemic year. The incidence rate rose to 540 per 100,000 the following year suggesting many cancers were diagnosed late, when treatment would be less effective.”

    But, no one could have seen that coming right? Right???

    I suppose there will still be some holdouts to argue that this is all fake and discreditable news.

    FYATHYRITO.

  • Red

    Here is an idea: Every Vehicle Insurance Policy comes with a free $30 steering wheel lock!

    Toyota Aqua once again NZ’s most stolen car, drives higher insurance costs

    Some Kiwis are paying nearly $3000 a year to insure their Toyota Aqua cars, with one insurer denying cover unless the vehicle has an immobiliser.

    The high price is because the Toyota Aqua is the most stolen car in the country, according to data provided to RNZ by three insurance companies.
    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/toyota-aqua-once-again-nzs-most-stolen-car-drives-higher-insurance-costs/J36ASF2UQFDYBEC4ORI3QNY7ZI/

    • thirteenstars

      I’ve owned a Ford Decapitator for years. Very low premiums.

    • Benedict Yu

      My 2002 Toyota Celica came with zero security. A child could open it up. I quickly installed after market security.

      Of course the reason for all this is that the chances of a Toyota Aqua being stolen in Japan are close to zero.

      “every Vehicle Insurance Policy comes with a free $30 steering wheel lock!”

      That will stop the car being stolen (probably). But it will not stop young teens from smashing every window just for the fun of it. I have seen it.

      • cmm

        My Jap import 1994 HiAce has no security either – other than being a manual.

        It is only insured for third party damage.

        I figure the average scum don’t drive manuals so it is probably quite safe.

        • thirteenstars

          “other than being a manual”

          Hilarious.

          What’s not funny is you can sit your test in an automatic but legally drive a manual. Anyone who ever learned in a manual will know that moving a gearshift while depressing and releasing a clutch while braking or accelerating requires a lot of practice and is quite unsafe if not done correctly while in traffic.

          That said, I can’t believe it’s still possible to tow a loaded trailer, including large furniture-type trailers, without a special endorsem*nt.

          Don’t get me started on parallel parking or multi-point turns that require reversing.

    • MCōs

      I just paid a little over a thousand dollars for about twenty one thousand dollars cover.
      I have a garage which I think keeps the cost down, but it didn’t seem cheap to me, but that’s a lot cheaper than three grand

    • cmm

      Another area in which Aotearoa is a world, well at least OECD, leader.

      Zero negative consequences to this behaviour, so why not?

  • Maggie Pie

    Had to larf….
    Ran into one of the girls from tennis up at NW before. She happened to mention she’d just heard about a Bar defying ‘Pride Month’ and promoting its very own….. ‘Heterosexual Awesomeness Month’.

    It was offering straight couples a 15% discount and free beer for the guys every Monday. Naturally enuff I immediately thort it must be Leo, until she just sent the link thru.
    Turns out it’s actually in Idaho. LOL!!

    https://x.com/libsoftiktok/status/1797422478148427924

    I mean it’s OK to be hetero, we need to support it while it’s still legal.

    • Stu2

      Slack journalism

      How much has it grown by in the last 3 and 6 years? What functions has it added?

      Are any specific functions being dropped? Are any specific functions the target of a lot of the reduction?

  • fernglas

    From the MoJ:
    “The number of burglaries per household fell significantly from 18 per 100 in 2018, to 16 per 100 in 2019 and to 14 per 100 in 2020. The percentage of households affected by burglary fell significantly from 12% to 10%.”
    This means that in New Zealand, you have a one in ten chance of being burgled every year, and close to one in five in 2018.
    In England, burglary affects 4.3 per 1000 people. Even Australia’s rate is 3.5%, a third of that in a good year in NZ. New Zealand has the world’s highest burglary rate.
    Burglaries intrude into people’s sense of privacy, security and the ability to feel safe in their own home. Why is the country so obviously prepared to tolerate this state of affairs?

  • Prince

    Is it really necessary for Stuff to auto-recycle on their main page a sped-up video of a player attacking a referee, in Namibia ?
    Scraping the bottom of the barrel now.

  • Prince

    Radio NZ, the Govt-subsidised mouthpiece for NZ’s left wing, reckons the opinions of the corrupt, entitled Tuku (Underpants) Morgan, who thinks he has the mana to charge his underwear to the NZ public, are worth considering.
    The sooner these puffed-up media ‘opinion leaders’ are forced to pay for themselves the better.

  • Ghost

    Another case that should be before the courts not the Teachers Disciplinary Tribunal.

    An assistant principal at Auckland’s James Cook High School has had his teaching registration cancelled after he was found to have had sexual relationships with three students.

    Article

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