General Debate 16 December 2012

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Colville

Ranger was robbed.
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December 16, 2012 8:21am
iMP

Christchurch is back. Go you good things. http://conzervative.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/christchurch-is-back/
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December 16, 2012 8:44am
mikenmild

Carlos had a good win.
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December 16, 2012 8:55am
Pete George

The Tripme website claims to promote education and information about drug use. To an extent it does that. But theybare also being blatantly dishonest.:

Tripme is funded by private donations and maintained by a team of volunteers.

This website is for educational and informational purposes only.

Except that it’s banner and prominent advertising links to drug sales sites, and it’s reviews have links to sales sites for the drugs being reviewed.

It seems to mostly be a vehicle for promoting drug use and sales. Tripme tripping up.
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December 16, 2012 8:56am
mikenmild

I’m sure that the sensible Mr Dunne would be all in favour of one consistent legal regime to cover all psychoactive substances.
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December 16, 2012 9:20am
Pete George

mikenmild – that’s impossible, there are vast practical differences between long entrenched habits of drug use like alcohol, tobacco and cannabis, compared to recently concocted synthetic drugs.
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December 16, 2012 9:27am
Manolo

DPF’s dream come true: http://www.suntimes.com/17019560-761/source-obama-has-chosen-john-kerry-as-secretary-of-state.html
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December 16, 2012 10:06am
hj

What is commonly termed “economic growth” today is a combination of productivity enhancements and population increase. In fact, nearly 70 per cent of so-called economic “growth” is not productivity rise but simply population increase, not to mention inflation and currency decline further skewing the statistics.
Population increase, however, is not real “growth.” It is nothing more than a per-capita decline in the essential qualities of life – i.e., per-capita space, environment, resources, etc.
Yet even in today’s out of balance world this sorry definition of “growth” persists within the economic profession. In effect, by confusing growth with per-capita diminution, it serves to produce a continually degenerated and overpopulated world – thus robbing future generations of the better, less-overcrowded, world we ourselves inherited.
Growth then is indeed a ponzi scheme, and at this stage in humanity’s devastation of the planet, it is nothing less than a crime. Yet we remain imprisoned within capital’s sick and self-defeating definition of growth and progress – largely due to capital’s overwhelming control of society and economy, as well as the persistence of religious idiocy. In effect, Balance is ex cathedra and outlawed.

“Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.”
Edward Abbey
……….
on the other hand, what the [f] does he know…?
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December 16, 2012 10:15am
mikenmild

That’s right Pete, the current ‘legal’ industries have too much invested in the status quo, which is faithfully upheld by by their political stooges.
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December 16, 2012 10:16am
mikenmild

Excellent choice by Obama to nominate John Kerry. Risks an awkward senate by-election, but the political momentum is definitely with the president now.
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December 16, 2012 10:17am
Manolo

Kerry, an honest and modest man, ideal companion to the Messiah:
http://www.newsmax.com/InsideCover/US-Kerry-Yacht/2010/07/23/id/365507
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December 16, 2012 10:20am
hj

This is a good book for understanding Bedouin (and Arab) culture, but also demonstrates (I think) why modern life isn’t for everybody [evolutionary psychology].
The Bedouin’s survival depended on his generosity and his reputation as well as his skills in the desert. While not what we would call educated their powers of observation were amazing when it came to things like camel tracks.
http://www.amazon.com/Arabian-Penguin-Classics-Wilfred-Thesiger/dp/0141442077
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December 16, 2012 10:33am
Viking2

I see the Rob Talbot has died.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10854364
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December 16, 2012 10:51am
Reid

So Hillary is not testifying at the Benghazi hearings as determined by Kerry. For those who’ve been following this story there is a lot between the lines in this latest excuse.

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/12/15/us/us-hillary-clinton-concussion/index.html?hpt=hp_t3
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December 16, 2012 11:22am
flipper

Sorry, do you mean Kerry or Heinz?
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December 16, 2012 11:34am
Reid

Jodi Seth, spokeswoman for Sen. John Kerry, Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman, said in a statement that Clinton would not testify before that committee Thursday.

“Secretary Clinton’s team contacted Senator Kerry this morning to inform them of the Secretary’s concussion. Senator Kerry was relieved to hear that the Secretary is on the mend, but he insisted that given her condition, she could not and should not appear on Thursday as previously planned, and that the nation’s best interests are served by the report and hearings proceeding as scheduled with senior officials appearing in her place,” Seth said.
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December 16, 2012 12:20pm
bhudson

Growth then is indeed a ponzi scheme

If you are a Malthusian perhaps. He’s not been proven right yet.
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December 16, 2012 12:31pm
Reid

The US continues to “pwotect” its citizens.

http://rt.com/usa/news/agency-us-nctc-surveillance-998/
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December 16, 2012 1:13pm
Harriet

“…The US continues to “pwotect” its citizens….” – Said Reid.

Reid’s link then had this as the first paragraph –

“….The Obama administration overruled recommendations from within the US Department of Homeland Security and implemented new guidelines earlier this year that allow the government to gather and analyze intelligence on every single US citizen…..”

Bawick continues to pwotect his citizens. 😎
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December 16, 2012 1:18pm
Harriet

oBLAHma is a communist Reid! 😎
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December 16, 2012 1:20pm
thedavincimode

Reid

Do you think Hillary might have been following this Bain business?
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December 16, 2012 1:23pm
Pauleastbay

http://tvnz.co.nz/entertainment-news/jack-tame-take-over-paul-holmes-radio-show-5294730

Oh for fucks sake. <blockquoteThe Radio Network's Dallas Gurney describes Tame as a talent to watch.

Very glad for internet radio and Spotify.
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December 16, 2012 1:29pm
Reid

Why Christmas is so magical:

http://www.zengardner.com/santa-claus-and-the-magic-mushrooms/
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December 16, 2012 1:53pm
Falafulu Fisi

The following documentary hosted by best selling author Brian Greene, should be interesting to kids who may want to pursue science study in the future. It is based on Dr. Greene’s book , The fabric of the cosmos. The entire world of modern electronics is built and designed using Quantum Mechanics, from cell phones to computers, etc,…

Dr Green explains it in a manner that is understandable to the general public and especially kids and students.

Quantum Mechanics

I’m in Einstein’s Camp in thinking that Quantum Mechanics is incomplete, since the theory itself is non-causal, ie, things seemed to pop into & out of existence, ie, no causes at all. Effects seems to come before the cause. Despite the undisputed proof (experimentally) of Quantum Mechanics, I hope that one brilliant physicist at some stage in the future, will bring a new theory or modify Quantum Mechanics so it is causal and makes sense.
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December 16, 2012 3:06pm
Fletch

Another great article by Brendan O’Neill from spiked on gay marriage.
Hard to know what to excerpt, as it’s all good, but go read the whole thing.

Consider the Lib-Con consultation report: it represents, at root, an elite rewriting of the meaning of marriage. It elbows aside the central role marriage played for centuries – as an institution through which not only a couple but communities themselves managed the socialisation of children and intergenerational relationships – in favour of decreeing that marriage is simply and definitively ‘about two people who love each other making a formal commitment to each other’.

The communal, social, generational import of marriage, its role as an institution which bound individuals into a broader community and even into process of history through their assumption of the responsibilities of procreation, has been demoted, replaced by the contemporary bourgeois view that marriage is simply about companionship, ‘two people’.

What we’re witnessing here is the state determination that the role of marriage that has been carved out by numerous communities over immensely long periods of time, free of state guidance, no longer has any relevance or cultural worth, since now, by state decree, marriage is about ‘love and commitment’ rather than having the ‘distinguishing purpose [of] having and raising children’.

It is striking that the report doesn’t once mention the creation of families and that every one of its eight mentions of the world ‘children’ is in response to, and criticism of, groups that petitioned the government to recognise the importance of marriage as an institution for the bearing and socialisation of the next generation. ‘Procreation’, ‘reproduction’, even ‘community’ – none of these appear in this new state ruling on what marriage is (though it does twice mention the needs of the ‘transgender community’).

What is happening here is a naked redefinition of marriage by the state, the diminution of the social, generational role played by marriage in communities, and its replacement by a highly individualised, companionship-based conception of marriage that speaks to the narrow needs of gay campaigners and the prejudices of modern bourgeois elites. In essence, all marriages are being redefined in order to massage the identity needs of small numbers of homosexuals who wish to define their relationships as marriages.

The report makes great play of the fact that it isn’t true that officials will start referring to mothers and fathers as ‘Progenitor A’ and ‘Progenitor B’, as some critics claimed; but that assurance rings hollow indeed in a long report that doesn’t once mention mothers or fathers, or family or community. The state’s demotion of the role of marriage as a fundamentally social, generational institution is implicit, and powerful, requiring no need for the explicit ditching of words like ‘mother’ or ‘father’; they’re simply not used rather than rewritten.

There is something spectacularly disingenuous about this report. It continually seeks to assure us that the state is not overhauling marriage – ‘the administrative processes will remain the same for marriage’, it says, with words like ‘husband and wife’ still being used ‘for legal purposes’. Yet while the administrative aspects of marriage might remain intact, the moral meaning of this institution for great swathes of the population and for communities throughout history is being radically rewritten; the purpose of marriage, its definition, is being overhauled. It has in fact been long accepted that the state has the authority to oversee the ‘administration’ and legal aspects of marriage, to broker marriage; but it has never been accepted that the state can tell individuals, community and society itself what marriage should mean to us. Until now. Now, the state has colonised the very meaning of marriage, which is ‘about two people’.

The state’s determination to interfere in marriage and re-determine its content and import and relationships reveals what is really motoring the gay marriage issue – not a desire to complete the drive for civil rights that kicked off 50 years ago, but rather a thirst for further expanding state authority over our private lives and relationships. In this sense, the Tories’ seemingly strange interest in an issue like gay marriage is in fact entirely in keeping with their, and the broader political elite’s, powerful instinct to meddle in and micromanage the worlds of parenting, the home, family, domestic relationships and intergenerational interaction today. ‘Gay marriage’ is merely a radical gloss attached to the continuing encroachment of the state upon our private, intimate lives. If unquestioned, and unquestionable, conventions make you uncomfortable, especially those forged by the elite above the heads and the alleged prejudices of the public with the aim of increasing the power of the state over communities, then you too should be freaked out by gay marriage.

http://www.spiked-online.com/site/article/13164/
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December 16, 2012 3:30pm
Reid

…the moral meaning of this institution for great swathes of the population and for communities throughout history is being radically rewritten…

Which is what I’ve been trying to point out to the profoundly useless idiots who support this travesty, since it first raised its ugly, evil head. And yet, no matter how many times you say it, the useless fools refuse to engage their minds and instead continue to bray about the “human wights” meme which is and always been, the cover story specifically designed to fool feeble-minded idiots who aren’t capable of thinking straight.

Thanks Fletch. Another bookmark to file away for use when the useless foolish morons resume their braying.
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December 16, 2012 4:31pm
Harriet

Reid & Fletch#

“…..The communal, social, generational import of marriage, its role as an institution which bound individuals into a broader community and even into process of history through their assumption of the responsibilities of procreation, has been demoted, replaced by the contemporary bourgeois view that marriage is simply about companionship, ‘two people’….”

“..that marriage is simply about companionship, ‘two people’….” – John Key has said exactly that!

But as I’ve often said about John Key – “The better part of his Marriage between himself and Bronagh is the development of his children into adults.”

But Key denies that, he thinks that the development of his children are unrelated to his Marriage -developed entirely outside of it -not ‘mostly’ within it.
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December 16, 2012 4:47pm
UglyTruth

The issue that the politicians really don’t like is authority in marriage. In a civil marriage the authority is with the state and the marriage occurs by licence. Originally authority in marriage belonged to the husband, and the state had no influence.

When the state has no authority in a marriage then it has no authority over children from that marriage, and when those children come of age they are free of any obligation to the state.
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December 16, 2012 4:57pm
nasska

UglyTruth

Delve a little further & it’s not hard to see what lies behind the Judeo Christian concept of marriage. None of the religious nutters who haunt this forum bring it up at the risk of undermining their moralistic, judgemental crap but marriage in the golden days of Godbotherering wasn’t quite what we know now.

At the top of the food chain were the leaders & gentry who needed a legal framework to ensure their property & titles passed on to their rightful & designated heirs. It would be a bit tough if the 17th Baronet of Middlerun turned out to be the result of the illicit coupling of the Lady of the Manor & the liveryman. Thus marriage was essentially a support agreement which guaranteed that the wife & issue were provided for so long as she kept her ankles behind her ears for the sole benefit of her old man.

On the other hand the peasantry followed what nature rather than the church ordained & were considered to be a couple after their couplings bore fruit, ie common law marriage. Since there was little money or land involved few in authority were interested.

In the 16th & 17th century leaders of the protestant church (eg Luther & Calvin) went as far as stating that “marriage to be no sacrament” & the responsibility of registration was passed over to the secular government.

Isn’t it strange that only now does the Christian church get bitter & twisted over who marries who given their relative disinterest in the subject for five centuries?
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December 16, 2012 5:41pm
krazykiwi

Isn’t it strange that only now does the Christian church get bitter & twisted over who marries who given their relative disinterest in the subject for five centuries?

I’m just fine thanks, but having read your previous paragraphs I’m quite certain who’s more bitter and twisted.
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December 16, 2012 6:02pm
Rex Widerstrom

Viking2 notes:

I see the Rob Talbot has died.

Nobody? Not even a post from DPF?

Alright, well let me say that as someone who regularly joins the chorus here and elsewhere lamenting that all MPs are lazy, arrogant egotists who wouldn’t know public service if a stressed and distressed taxpayer beat them senseless with it, Rob Talbot was an exception.

He spent something like 20 years as an electorate MP – no list safety nets in those days – and we have him to thank for, amongst other things, signing the then government-owned Telecom to cellular networks when it would have been easy to take a “wait and see” attitude which would have meant we would have had to have played catch-up later.

I dealt with him occasionnally in his role as Postmaster General (when the dear old Post Office still did things like issue licences for radio transmitters) and he was always unfailingly polite and courteous and never played the “I’m a Minister” card so beloved of less stellar colleagues such as Les Gandar. I’m saddened by the pasing of a thoroughly decent, hard working and kind man.
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December 16, 2012 6:03pm
Left Right and Centre

I’d like to read opinion on milk in schools provided by Fonterra… it’s probably been covered as a topic on Kiwiblog but still….

I’m shaking my head at the bullshit that I read about the upcoming scheme and the benefits of milk…

http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/6141553/Free-milk-coming-back-to-primary-schools

1) *Making milk cheaper would also greatly benefit children’s health, allowing them access to milk instead of cheap soft drinks.*

response: define ‘greatly benefit’? Also… what do they mean ‘access to milk instead of cheap soft drinks?’ Do primary schools have coke machines? Parents should be in charge of whether their primary school age children have access to soft drinks or not.

2) *Putaruru principal Trish Scown said providing free milk to schools would increase childrens’ learning. “It does make a huge difference to their learning and their general wellbeing,” she said.*

Cause and effect proof please? What a crock of shit!!

3) *”They’re definitely able to concentrate better and they’re able to be more involved in their learning if they aren’t always having to worry about a rumbling tummy.”*

Let’s say a rumbling stomach equals no learning. You could fill it with anything and solve the problem. It doesn’t have to be milk.

4) Pat Poland, Waikato principals association president: *As a child growing up in the free milk era, he said it would be of huge benefit for the children.*

Really? Why? Because their parents can’t provide an adequate diet for their own children and must in part rely on the help of Fonterra?

5) *DHB medical officer of health Felicity Dumble said one of the great things about milk was that it’s considered a `complete’ food, with a wide range of nutrients essential for growth.

Ms Dumble said when healthy basics became too expensive it exacerbated problems that led to malnutrition or even obesity.*

What’s a ‘complete’ food, tell me? Could I live on nothing but milk? I love milk.. but the scientific jury is out as to the exact health benefits of the stuff.. how much you need… you can also get all the nutrition that is found in milk in other foods. The economics of what parents can afford to provide for children is a MASSIVE can of worms brushed off by these mindless toeing the line bandwagon feel good factor cliche quotes.

6) *But free school milk will be a public relations winner for the farmer-owned company, which controls the price of milk at most sales levels in New Zealand.*

So… the core purpose is that it’s a PR exercise? You also could try to argue that if you buy Fonterra milk, then you involuntarily subsidize other people’s kid’s daily free milk.

7) *Poverty Action Waikato researcher Anna Cox said it was good news, if true.

“Anything like that is great, particularly given the increasing cost of food – this move would benefit a lot of people.”*

Yes, hand-outs are good, aren’t they?

To temper some of the idiocy above are the following:

1) *During the milk price row Federated Farmers said New Zealanders were not paying too much compared to other countries.*

And 2) *Free milk was last seen in Kiwi primary schools 44 years ago* *The scheme was dropped in 1967 by the government of the day on cost grounds and because the public was starting to question the benefits of milk.*

3) So there you go… the public started questioning the benefits of milk. Good for them back in 1967.

Diet and nutrition is controversial, with a lot of disagreement about what people should eat for optimal health. What I know is that parents need to do their homework regarding their child’s diet and make the best informed decisions that they can. Rather than being told by a bunch of cretons what is best for their children and accepting it blindly. There’s not that many calories to play around with in anyone’s diet, least of all a child’s. 250mls of milk for eg, believe it or not, can take up enough of them to make it worth questioning whether it’s worthwhile. 250mls of green top milk is 154kj/ 100 x 2.5 = 385kj. A five year old girl might take in around 1 545 calories per day. Convert kj to calories 385/ 4.18ky per calorie = 92 calories. That’s 6%. Doesn’t sound like a lot… I’m just saying. And anyway.. if it’s 300mls they get.. there’s no detail yet of course on portion size or days per week.

If it was my child.. I would tell them that I’m in charge of my child’s nutrition… end of story.

Anyone got any thoughts?

http://www.weightlossresources.co.uk/children/nutrition_calorie_needs.htm
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December 16, 2012 6:13pm
nasska

krazykiwi

….” I’m quite certain who’s more bitter and twisted.”…..

Not really B & T but just a little bit cynical after reading the regular crap posted here by God’s little helpers. After all you would be hard pressed to deny that I’ve presented the Churches’ attitude quite fairly.

On a brighter note tidings of your good health & well being give me great pleasure. 🙂
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December 16, 2012 6:13pm
Fletch

Left Right and Centre, I posted the other day on the GD thread about the milk news item on One News where someone commented that milk is “a luxury that many can’t afford”. Since when? I doubt there are many who could not afford a bottle of milk. Perhaps give up that lotto ticket, or pack of cigarettes for the good of your children.
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December 16, 2012 6:17pm
nasska

Left Right and Centre

Interesting comment. Two points:

1) What happens in a few years time when Fonterra decides to can the idea…..will the government of the day be forced to pick up the idea at taxpayer expense?

2) On the upside, whatever the pros & cons, milk does contain a good dollop of calcium which I understand to be missing from many kid’s diets.
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December 16, 2012 6:22pm
Viking2

BAD PARROT

A youngish man named Wayne received a parrot
as a gift. The parrot had a bad attitude and an even worse
vocabulary.
Every word out of the bird’s mouth was rude,
obnoxious and laced with profanity.

Wayne tried and tried to change the bird’s
attitude by consistently saying only polite words, playing
soft music and anything else he could think of to “clean up”
the bird’s vocabulary.

Finally, Wayne was fed up and he yelled at
the parrot. The parrot yelled back. Wayne shook the parrot
and the parrot got angrier and even more rude.

Wayne, in desperation, threw up his hand,
grabbed the bird and put him in the freezer. For a few
minutes the parrot squawked and kicked and screamed. Then
suddenly there was total quiet. Not a peep was heard for
over a minute.

Fearing that he’d hurt the parrot, Wayne
quickly opened the door to the freezer. The parrot calmly
stepped out onto Wayne’s outstretched arms and said “I
believe I may have offended you with my rude language and
actions. I’m sincerely remorseful for my inappropriate
transgressions and I fully
intend to do everything I can to correct my
rude and unforgivable vocabulary and behaviour.”

Wayne was stunned at the change in the
bird’s attitude.
As he was about to ask the parrot what had
made him agree to make such a dramatic change to his
vocabulary and behaviour, the bird whispered:

“May I ask what the turkey did?”
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December 16, 2012 6:26pm
Viking2

http://www.youtube.com/embed/W86jlvrG54o?rel=0
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December 16, 2012 6:46pm
Viking2

A doctor examining a woman who had been rushed to the Emergency Room, Took the husband aside, and said, ‘I don’t like the looks of your wife at all.’

‘Me neither doc,’ said the husband. ‘But she’s a great cook and really good with the kids.’
___________________________________________

An old man goes to the Wizard to ask him if he can remove a curse he has been living with for the last 40 years.

The Wizard says, ‘Maybe, but you will have to tell me the exact words that were used to put the curse on you.’

The old man says without hesitation, ‘I now pronounce you man and wife.’
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December 16, 2012 6:49pm
Viking2

Please be advised, I am sick and tired of answering questions about my dog, who mauled Six people wearing Gillard tee shirts, Four wearing Swan tee shirts, three flag burners, and a Muslim taxi driver.

FOR THE LAST TIME… THE DOG IS NOT FOR SALE !! !

I’M TRYING TO TALK HIM INTO QUITTING SMOKING,

BUT HE SAYS IT HELPS GET THE BAD TASTE OUT OF HIS MOUTH !!!???
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December 16, 2012 6:52pm
Pauleastbay

1965 -School milk remember it well, left out in the sun for 2- 3 hours before being handed out. Lovin it. Behind the the bike sheds at All Hallows Primary School ,Geraldine there was a hollow tree stump that had 50 gallons a day poured into it.

2013. Trim milk only so the fat little bastards don’t get any fatter.
Each school having to get food hygiene certified to be able to dish the milk out.
Each school having to shell out for a chiller to keep the milk at a constant 17 degrees
Every parent having to sign an authority to allow little Johnny to be able to partake.
The school board having to supply alternatives for the lactose intolerant so they don’t feel left out and their feelings hurt
Teachers will want an extra teacher only day to learn how to distibute the milk in several different languages, again so indiviuals are not made to feel different
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December 16, 2012 7:00pm
Viking2

Some guy just knocked on my door selling raffle tickets for poor black orphans. I said, “Fuck that!
knowing my luck, I’d win one!”
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December 16, 2012 7:11pm
Viking2

I was banging this nice Lady over her kitchen table when we heard the front door open.
She said, “It’s my husband! Quick, try the back door!”
Thinking back, I really should have run – but you don’t get offers like that every day.

Sorry for not calling you on New Years, I just got out of jail. I got locked up for punching the fuck out of this
idiot at a party. In my defense – when you hear an Arab counting down from 10, your instincts kick in.

I saw a fortune teller the other day. She told me I would come into some money.
Last night I fucked a girl called Penny.
Is that spooky or what?

What’s the difference between an illegal Mexican and ET?
ET looked better, smelled better, learned English, didn’t claim benefits, had his own fucking bike, and wanted
to go home!
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December 16, 2012 7:13pm
Left Right and Centre

I humbly apologise for my atrocious and ignorant misspelling of the word ‘cretin’.

Reply to nasska: Thank you. Regarding 1) The question relates to an event that has yet to happen. If and when it does…. I really don’t have an answer to that. I will be surprised to see *milk served daily in 100% of all NZ primary schools to every child* by anyone to start off with. If it does eventuate… your guess is as good as anyone’s. Personally… I’d like to refer the actual likeliness of the taxpayer taking over to someone smarter or older or wiser than myself.

2) nasska… on a personal note so you know where I come from… I doubt there’s been a single day of my 35 years on earth when milk hasn’t entered my body. I used to drink the stuff straight from the plastic container. My heart **sank** when I realised just how many calories it contributed to my diet, and I was 20kg overweight up until the last two months. So I can’t drink milk… too many calories. I have it in tea. But let’s be honest. I’m drinking ‘tea lite’ with no sugar and a few piss drops of ‘water milk’. I’ve taken tea to the very brink of total pointless foulness.. and yet as a hopeless addict… I persist.

Aaaaaaaaand…. I’m back. Yes, there’s some good nutrition in milk. That nutrition comes at a cost. Calories. Teaching children to drink milk which has got a fair few old calories in it.. is not actually the best habit that they want to carry with them through to adulthood. They talk about childhood obesity. If you add milk, you have to give up something else.

How about a fresh fruit and veg in schools programme? How about a bananas in school programme?

And anyway… most parents do not need Fonterra to take over the welfare of their children… they can provide all of their children’s needs. So is it perhaps slightly redundant to get milk out in front of *every primary age child* in NZ?

The way these people are singing the praises of milk… my goodness… you’d think that dairy and animal based products are the answer to everything nutritionally related. How about a lean red meat in schools day? Why not just identify who the poor kids are and sort out their entire diet while they’re at school and leave the well-looked after children to get on with it? Isn’t that a better use of resources? Give them breakfast and lunch at school and a ‘packed dinner’. Seeing as benefits and income supplements are not enough for the families of these children to take good care of them.

The actual macro nutrient return on milk isn’t that great. The extra slim milk I have here says 3.7g protein/ 100mls, 5.1g carbohydrate/ 100mls. No fat of course. That’s not a great return for the calories. The calcium and other stuff can be found in other sources. You could make an argument that milk is in fact quite full of ’empty calories’. Food for thought.

Of course children in poverty who don’t know what Weetbix look like… well sure… let them rip the milk away from you with their starving little hands.
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December 16, 2012 7:16pm
Viking2

Getting engaged. Great chuckle,

http://www.youtube.com/embed/dYslhL71k1M?rel=0
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December 16, 2012 7:22pm
HB

our local intermediate (decile 2, I think) has free fruit for the kids.

I believe the Ministry pays for it.

Apparently all but a very few come to school with good lunchboxes but nevertheless the fruit is popular. A bit better than the mil k as the fruit doesn’t need refrigerating and lasts better. Also more variety to cater for different preferences and very healthy.
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December 16, 2012 7:23pm
Left Right and Centre

Reply to Fletch:

I’ll have a look at your comment in the other thread. And I agree with your comment here 100%.

There’s a few dropkicks out there who buy the extras ahead of the basics. When we call an item ‘basic’ or a ‘luxury’… yes, it’s subjective. So let’s just say… most kiwi residents can afford to buy enough milk to satisfy their dietary requirements.

You can make the argument that milk isn’t vitally necessary for good health. The vegans don’t drop dead without it and claim to have excellent health. And if it is a luxury… well… there’s lots of luxuries that people do without… no matter what your income. No-one has the luxury of time… there’s a limited resource no matter who you are.

Luxury is relative. It’s a loaded word with all kinds of meanings and connotations depending on the context. Perhaps if you buy milk as part of a balanced diet you colud say it is a ‘basic essential’ on your sohpping list… if you buy it to make milkshakes for a party… it becomes reclassified as a ‘luxury item’.

My answer to the ‘milk as luxury’ quote is to compare the price of milk relative to income levels across time and see what’s what. But a smart cookie knows that it’s just more of the ceaseless waves of news quote bunk which long-suffering viewers are subjected to endlessly. That’s why you end up turning it off. (At least for a while)
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December 16, 2012 7:34pm
Harriet

LeftRight&Centre#

Get used to hearing all this crap as tobacco is finished and now they’re moving onto obesity & mental health in children, which encompasses everything.

You need not worry as all that they’re talking about is a ‘balanced lifestyle’ – stuff we learnt at school.

Most policy in government departments nowdays is aimed at educating the bottom halve of society, educational policy is mostly about slow learners and kids with ‘issues’ as all other kids generally teach themselves after a little encouragement. Policeing is clearly aimed at educating the dumb.
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December 16, 2012 7:34pm
Fletch

According to this article on Stuff from October, kids aren’t liking the milk and numbers taking it have dropped way down.

Free milk has left a sour taste in the mouths of some of Northland’s schools and a large numbers of their students have dropped out of the pilot programme which was launched on March 19.

After an enthusiastic take-up, some schools have seen nearly a 90 per cent decline in the number of kids receiving milk each day, with many blaming the taste of the ultra heat treated (UHT) milk.

“The kids wrote letters to Fonterra thanking them for the milk, but fewer were drinking it because of the taste it left in their mouth,” said Dave Bradley, Wellsford School principal.

The school said half the 240 children initially drinking the milk have opted out.

At Kaiwaka nearly 70 of the school’s 86 children were drinking the milk. It is now down to 10.

“I am beginning to wonder if kids are so used to sugar that they don’t want to drink milk anymore,” said principal Barbara Bronlund.

At Waipu School 170 milk drinkers had become 20. Flavour was again a problem.

MORE
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December 16, 2012 7:45pm
Fletch

Here’s a quote from the end of the story similar to what someone said on One News the other night –

At Kaitaia Primary School milk was reaching those most in need.

“We are decile 1C for a good reason.

“We have a number of families who struggle financially, and with the cost of fresh food and milk they just can’t afford it,” principal Brendon Morrissey said.
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December 16, 2012 7:46pm
mikenmild

Harriet is clearly looking forward to receiving her education from the Police, I see.
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December 16, 2012 7:46pm
Left Right and Centre

@pauleastbay:

Yeah… 1965… those were the days all right. Whoa, hang on… no… I wasn’t born for a while yet.

You’re killing me with the PC list that would accompany the milk…. that’s a riot.

I had the joy of school dinners in the UK which were *to die for*. Just as your post would predict… some muppet kids had their own tables for parents who turned their noses up at the fab food put on by the dinner ladies and they sat with their ET and Star Wars home packed lunch boxes. Right before coming to NZ? Genius mother decides I’d better get used to packed lunches… bye bye heavenly school dinners. Today I’d be able to get counseling for that.
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December 16, 2012 7:54pm
nasska

After hours of questioning, the journalist finally breaks and shouts at the politician,

“Are you completely incapable of giving a straight answer?”

“Well, in some ways yes and in other ways no. Allow me to use the following analogy to explain.”
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December 16, 2012 8:00pm
Left Right and Centre

@milkenmaid: I received my education from the police years ago. Stop driving a Nissan 300ZX Fairlady and you’ll never get pulled over.

@Harriet: I can’t remember anything I learnt in primary school. For a while they had a fish and chip Friday and you could order it and have it at lunchtime. Can you imagine that today? Teachers used to throw chalk dusters… I was called a whining pom.. I probably was… still am.. but with a kiwi accent now… they made me sit through lunch to finish some stupid storybook. Can’t remember anything about balanced lifestyle or nutrition. This was the 80s. Hidings were still legal!! Stone age.
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December 16, 2012 8:02pm
mikenmild

Lft right etc
I will never be pulled over by the Police. So there.
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December 16, 2012 8:23pm
Left Right and Centre

@mikenmild…. I really really really really did genuinely read your name as milkenmaid… sorry man!!!! That wasn’t a deliberate pisstake.. you’ll just have to trust me.

I’m glad you’re not creating the need for more cops in society. Less if anything. Less cops means one less of the less intelligent of their number floating around hopefully that I might have to deal with… you never know. I thank you for your law-abiding nature with that in mind.
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December 16, 2012 8:38pm
Left Right and Centre

Reply to Fletch:

Related story some group of feel-gooders started a breakfast in schools programme in one of the ‘unshithot’ suburbs in Lower Hutt… I think Naenae.. I’ll have to look for the source. And what happened? I think they got about two brown kids. It started at 7 in the am. That’s not that early, but it’s early to get your kids up in time to get to school to eat food. And what do they do? Stay there? Geez that’s a long school day. 7am-3pm. Bugger that!!

It was a fizzer then. I did see at the time the Northland scheme falling over as well…. too funny.

**“We have a number of families who struggle financially, and with the cost of fresh food and milk they just can’t afford it,” principal Brendon Morrissey said.**

Yes, it’s all the cost of fresh food and milk’s fault. If I went out and had a netball team’s worth of kids I can’t look after… would I then say it’s because the food costs more than 10c per item? You’d like to look at these families case by case and then of course all the bullshit would be uncovered and the true foul stench would be unholy.

Yes… because potatoes are just so fucking UNAFFORDABLE at $1per kilo for a 10kg sack…. ye gods!!
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December 16, 2012 8:49pm
Steve (North Shore)

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10854473&ref=rss

Ngati Rangiwewehi and Tapuika will each receive financial redress of $6 million and specific cultural redress packages.

Ngati Rangiwewehi chief executive Kahuariki Hancock said on the iwi’s website that while it was not possible to be fully compensated, the settlement would provide redress in recognition of its historical grievance and toward restoring the relationship between iwi and the Crown.

Specific redress?

WHEN DOES THIS SHIT STOP? I am sick of paying for the lazy people!!!!!!
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December 16, 2012 9:13pm
cha

There’s an election in Japan and this bloke is a potential PM.

His greatest hits include:

In 1990, Ishihara said in a Playboy interview that the Rape of Nanking was a fiction, claiming, ”People say that the Japanese made a holocaust but that is not true. It is a story made up by the Chinese. It has tarnished the image of Japan, but it is a lie.”[31]

In 2000, Ishihara, one of the eight judges for a literary prize, commented that homosexuality is abnormal, which caused an outrage in the gay community in Japan.[34]

In a 2001 interview with women’s magazine Shukan Josei, Ishihara said that he believed “old women who live after they have lost their reproductive function are useless and are committing a sin,” adding that he “couldn’t say this as a politician.”

In 2010, Ishihara claimed that Korea under Japanese rule was absolutely justified due to historical pressures from Qing Dynasty and Imperial Russia.[39]
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December 16, 2012 9:33pm
wat dabney

milkmaid it is then.
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December 16, 2012 9:37pm
big bruv

A question for the god botherers….

20 children shot in the USA, 22 children stabbed in China…where the hell was your God while all this was happening?
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December 17, 2012 5:44am
mikenmild

Just a wild guess: those religious types will say these things happen because we have turned away from imaginary deities.
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December 17, 2012 7:23am
joana

Big Bro,
The killer in China was a mad max muslim so perhaps you should be having a gripe about Allah.
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December 17, 2012 7:25am
graham

big bruv and mikenmild:

If you’re genuinely curious, you’re both smart enough to work it out – or at least, work out who to ask for a greater insight. (Here’s a clue – asking random people who you don’t know on a blog makes about as much sense as asking those same people to advise you on your cancer treatment).

If, however, you’re just trying to provoke a reaction because you’re bored – why bother? I’m not going to change your point of view, you’re not going to change mine, so why bother?
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December 17, 2012 7:49am
mikenmild

That’s a very existential start to a morning’s musing on this blog. Why do you do what you do, graham?
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December 17, 2012 8:02am
graham

Why do any of us do what we do, mikenmild?

The answer is … 42.

But what is the question?
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December 17, 2012 8:14am

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