General Debate 30 March 2017

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holysheet

Who would live in Auckland. Yesterday I had the misfortune to travel up to the North Shore. Left Ohaupo 8.30. Got to Hampton Downs 9.30. It took a further 2 and a quarter hours getting to the north shore.
With the new Waikato Expressway touted to take 30 mins off the trip from Cambridge to Auckland, unless Auckland gets it’s shit together, all that money spent on the expressway is a total waste.
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March 30, 2017 8:01am
- Keeping Stock
  
  I know what you mean holysheet. We called in to our Auckland office a year or so ago on a Friday afternoon on our way to Northland. It took us longer to get from New North Road to the motorway north than it would take to drive from Whanganui to Palmerston North, and halfway back.
  
  We have the best of both worlds; a business in Auckland which we run from Whanganui, and an extra 10 to 20 hours per week of leisure time because we’re not spending half our lives stuck in traffic. We can also afford to live down country in a home which would be far, far out of our price range up there. We wouldn’t swap what we have here for anything.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:06am
  - Simon
    
    Immigration is now out of control. Immigration was probably necessary back in the 1990s & into the early 2000s.
    
    The quality of life in Auckland is declining due to too many people crammed in a small area.
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:12am
    - GazzaW
      
      On the contrary Simon. Life has improved radically in Auckland with the upsurge in immigration. The traffic may seem overwhelming to outsiders but it’s all relative. I’ve worked in Tokyo, Bangkok & Jakarta and Auckland’s problems are minimal in comparison. Foreign immigration is just one factor for Auckland’s population growth. Should we also stop returning Kiwis from living in Auckland? Should we stop fellow Kiwis ‘immigrating’ to Auckland from other parts of NZ? They all add equally to our perceived traffic woes.
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:41am
      - Jack5
        
        Nope, first we should just scare the banksters from borrowing heavily overseas to fund those buying into the Auckland property bubble.
        
        Second we should stop our universities and the swathe of pseudo-universities and language schools and similar con set-ups from effectively selling NZ citizenship to foreigners (mainly Asian, but soon Middle Easterners) who want to “study” here.
        
        Third, we should stop Treasury and other officials feeding the bullshit that NZ is a miracle economy when the fact is that the country has had balance of payments deficits for nigh on half a century.
        
        The resultant dive in the kiwi dollar will not only mean the export-based regions of NZ survive and thrive, but also will take the growth pressure off Auckland.
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:45am
      - Jack5
        
        GazzaW ‘s post includes: “Life has improved radically in Auckland with the upsurge in immigration.”
        
        Improved for whom? Real estate agents, immigration consultants, people running rort educational set-ups for young foreigners (at the moment mainly Indian) to get a back door entrance to NZ citizenship?
        
        Not for the beggars who now seem widespread in Auckland, nor for the folk squeezed into garages in south Auckland.
        
        Still the big population re-engineering was approved and introduced by politicians after much open public discussion, debate, and voting, wasn’t it. The biggest national change since the Treaty of Waitangi, received a full, democratic consideration. Didn’t it ??????
        
        (Two posts from me, because I’m testing the editing functions of Kiwiblog under https v. http, and https is definitely the way to go to Kiwiblog.)
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:56am
      - GazzaW
        
        Jack.
        My comments are made as a 70s+ Aucklander of 62 years permanent residence aside from periodic job-related offshore sojourns which I guess give me the advantage of viewing my home town from an international aspect as well. For all the hype, Auckland’s traffic problems are a bit of an urban myth and not too different to the growing pains of other international centres of commerce. In fact, our roading system is way better than many. Sure, I spent 50 minutes on the harbour bridge yesterday because a truck had broken down but that could happen anywhere. I’ve worked in Asia and I’m very comfortable with the continuing growth of Auckland’s Asian community. They have added much to our city and quite frankly without them not only would Auckland suffer economically but the whole of NZ as well. I live in what is perceived to be a leafy ‘Kiwi’ suburb but increasing numbers of our neighbours are Chinese, Vietnamese, Filipino, Indian & Sri Lankan and what a joy they are to have in our neighbourhood with their fine family values – hardworking, no crime, nice kids, no boomboxes and no roudy parties. Horror of horrors, Auckland Kiwis are now marrying Asian girls and boys and having mixed-ancestry kids. Yes, there are some growing pains – my kids like thousands of others have had their housing worries but then so did I and so did my parents. NZ needs to get over its anti-immigrant attitudes – we are all either immigrants or descended from immigrants and earlier generations have copped it just as the Asians are now. The Irish (for being drunken Catholics), the Brits (whingeing unionists), the Dutch (stingey buggers who pinched Kiwi jobs).
        
        Sorry to rant on but I get brassed off with my home town being perpetually slagged off. It’s a top spot and there’s no way I’ll be moving out in a hurry. The rest of NZ seems happy to have a go at Auckland and that’s fair enough if that’s what spins your wheels but I guess we are always open to secession (along with our colony in Tauranga).
        
        This wasn’t aimed at you Jack – rather some latent anger and frustrations bubbling through.
        
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        March 30, 2017 3:20pm
  - Dave Mann
    
    I’m glad you’re happy with where you live, but its all relative really. You get used to the traffic and while its more congested than Wanganui it’s not a big deal.
    
    I love Auckland, with its beaches, it’s lovely walks easily accessible, it’s 2 beautiful harbours, it’s restaurant and cafe life, it’s business and marketing environment, its multi-ethnic population and it’s general pulse of life.
    
    I’ve lived and travelled all over NZ and frankly my pick is Auckland. The reason there’s more traffic here is simply because more people want to live here.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:48am
    - Inandout
      
      Commuters are like caged animals for the duration of their journey; helpless and locked in. This is not good news for human longevity.
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:41am
      - Dave Mann
        
        Hahaha what a laughable over-dramatisation!
        
        Or…. people travelling to productive relatively well paid (compared to many countries) work in comfort and ease, talking to their friends and family on cellphones (miraculous technology) and/or reading Kiwiblog and browsing the wealth of the internet while sipping on delicious takeaway coffee….
        
        It all depends on your perspective, and yours seems to be a ‘glass empty’ vision.
        
        EDIT: No.. I’m kidding. Still can’t edit 😀
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:57am
      - GazzaW
        
        You can’t be serious Inandout. Whether you are commuting via bus, train, ferry or private car there’s real downtime for some mental refreshment. Sure, a car commute limits you to audio pastimes but there’s a multitude of radio stations to choose from or CDs for your favourite music or even talking books and language lessons. Public transport commuters have the added luxuries of reading, video and TV – or even talking to their fellow commuters should they feel so inclined. It is great news for longevity.
        
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        March 30, 2017 4:15pm
  - ztev
    
    Wait till you need specialist medical treatment, youll be travelling to Wellington a lot- same happens in Nelson.
    Never mind you can then move back to a larger city and buy a studio apartment with the funds from the sale of your provincial city estate.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:50am
    - Keeping Stock
      
      Despite what the local and national Labour Party shills say ztev, we have very good health services here in Whanganui.
      
      And if, God forbid, Mrs Stock or I gets seriously ill, our health needs will be met by the generous medical insurance plan we offer all our staff as part of their employment package. We do that because we are good employers, not scumbag capitalist pricks as some would categorise us 😎
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:57am
      - holysheet
        
        Well said sir. The left don’t like it up em.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:25am
      - ztev
        
        Urology, all done in Palmerston North.
        Whanganui has a Urology Nurse
        Heart problems ? Only day stay procedures public or private in your region, so it will be down to Wellington for you .
        
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        March 30, 2017 12:08pm
      - GazzaW
        
        You are such a misery guts ztev. Honestly, why do you hang around Kiwiblog? You’re anti everything and anti everybody. That you provide links and obviously have access to parliamentary information sources indicates that you either work or have worked in the inner sanctums of parliament but for fucks sake lighten up and stop disputing everything and everybody. At least you’re consistent though – you never post anything positive.
        
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        March 30, 2017 4:27pm
      - ztev
        
        You poor snowflake gazza.
        lean in closer and tell me your concerns so I can tell you to..
        STFU
        
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        March 30, 2017 7:02pm
      - GazzaW
        
        I just had to upvote you to sweeten your miserable existence ztrev. What does STFU mean? Us melted snowflakes are so naive.
        
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        March 30, 2017 7:41pm
- Padriv Ustoev
  
  We obviously need to build another stadium to fix this problem. I’m glad we have wise and competent men in the city council worrying about the things that matter in this great City of Sails. Or is it Simply Auckland?
  I forget now, better do some more re-branding and international marketing. And I think we need one more monthly magazine to tell people what is happening in Auckland.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:13am
  - Paulus Gnome
    
    Or a quarterly invoice to remind us of our ongoing ever burgeoning obligation
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:19am
  - ztev
    
    The motorways are state highways and are the sole responsibility of central government.
    Look how long the western tunnels were delayed by national after being approved by the Clark government 9 years ago. So many RONS and so little money
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:53am
    - Captain Mainwaring
      
      What have you been smoking Trevor-impersonator? Clark was the one who refused to let a motorway go through her suburb of Mt. Albert and it only got started when National made it happen.
      Likewise with Transmission Gully and the Kapiti bypass.
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:04am
      - holysheet
        
        Well said sir. The left don’t like it up em.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:26am
      - ztev
        
        Refused ?
        
        As usual you are wrong!
        The go ahead for the tunnels was done in 2008 as this reference to the Tresuary report specifies.
        “4. On 18 August 2008, the Cabinet Business Committee [CBC Min (08) 22/18] agreed to a
        work programme to further consider the procurement of the Waterview Connection….
        
        http://www.beehive.govt.nz/sites/all/files/Business_case_for_the_Waterview_Connection.pdf
        
        Tunnels were the proposal then and thats what will open in the next few months
        
        The mystery is why national delayed it for 4-5 years otherwise it would have been completed years ago
        
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        March 30, 2017 12:22pm
    - Captain Mainwaring
      
      ztev, after years of procrastination the tunnels UNDER rather than THROUGH Mt. Albert were finally agreed to, just in time for the change of Govt. Had the Nats been in charge at the time, a few houses would have been relocated and the motorway would have followed a much cheaper overland route.
      Thanks Hulun for wasting all that money.
      
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      March 30, 2017 1:45pm
      - ztev
        
        No again.
        The tunnels were agreed to at the time of the Clark government.
        When national won the election, Joyce said we are not having these fancy tunnels now we are in charge, so the plan was changed to a mix of bridges and trenches.
        Trouble is the contractors said the tunnels were the more viable alternative.
        
        “In May 2009, NZTA announced its new preferred route for the Waterview Connection motorway as a combination of surface, bored tunnel and cut and cover tunnel.
        http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/5235923/New-Waterview-motorway-approved
        
        Obviously THAT never happened. As usual Im totally right.
        All Tunnels- labour
        Mostly surface- national
        All tunnels -national
        That was my first job , motorway planning. You are up against an expert on what was proposed, changed, etc
        
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        March 30, 2017 6:47pm
- MCos
  
  We moved to Auckland a few years ago when I retired and don’t regret it at all.
  Not having to drive around in the rush hours is a big bonus apparently.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:38am
- dime
  
  yesterday was brutal.
  
  the worst traffic ive experienced since i moved onto the Dime estate.
  
  My normal commute is 25 mins max.. yesterday was over an hour.
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:14am
  - Captain Mainwaring
    
    Once about 10 years ago it took me an hour to get from Parnell to Newmarket.
    Thank Christ I no longer live in Auckland.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:37am
    - holysheet
      
      And how many pubs were included in that crawl?
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:27am
      - Captain Mainwaring
        
        Wish it was true. If I was walking I could have had a pint in every pub and still made it quicker, but I was driving a car.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:49am
- Fletch
  
  I remember, back when I was a little kid, that you could go out on the motorway on the weekend and actually not see any cars. Just the odd one here and there. How times have changed.
  
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  March 30, 2017 11:40am
Keeping Stock

Where’s William/Denis?
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March 30, 2017 8:01am
- holysheet
  
  who cares, my posts are more important don’t you know ?
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:05am
  - Keeping Stock
    
    Quite so!
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:07am
- Paulus Gnome
  
  Gathering phlegm.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:14am
- Manolo
  
  His poems are absolute crap,
  his comments are dross,
  do you miss William’s inane pap?,
  I don’t believe he is a loss.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:17am
Captain Mainwaring

The MSM seems to be totally focused on dredging up bleeding-heart stories which are designed to make the Government look like heartless Shylocks.

“Quadriplegic stuck at Wellington Airport doesn’t know where he’s going to sleep.” (Because Wellington airport is closed by fog).
“Child kicked off school bus 3 kms from home.” (Because parents were three weeks behind with the fare and had been reminded several times).
“House insurance to cost more due to 40% fire service levy increase.” (70c per week. Big deal). “And car insurance to go up by 5c.per week.” Not a mention of car registration going DOWN by about 70% in the last couple of years thanks to the Nats fixing ACC.

We can expect a lot more of this crap as we head up to the election.
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March 30, 2017 8:02am
- krazykiwi
  
  The kid had to walk 3kms?
  
  That’s an excellent outcome.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:10am
  - pdm
    
    True – when I was 10 I had to walk about 1.5ks just to catch the school bus.
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:16am
    - fernglas
      
      School bus? Luxury. We had to crawl 30k down a gravel road to get to our shared unicycle……
      
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      March 30, 2017 8:31am
      - Longknives
        
        In the snow..
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:00am
      - Ed Snack
        
        Crawl, gravel,…you were lucky…
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:34am
      - ztev
        
        That was nothing, we lived in a ditch behind the bustop
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:55am
      - VicParking
        
        Not before milking the cows and chopping the firewood for the copper.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:57am
      - Keeping Stock
        
        There was hundred and fifty of us livin’ in shoebox in middle of t’road.
        
        Cardboard box?
        
        Aye.
        
        You were lucky!
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:59am
      - krazykiwi
        
        Luxury. We used to have to get out of the lake at six o’clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of ‘ot gravel, work twenty hour day at mill for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would thrash us to sleep with a broken bottle, if we were lucky!
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:26am
      - GoVege
        
        Least you had a dad KK….or at least knew his identity…unlike many kids today.
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:10am
      - RF
        
        Our family of 10 children used to live at the city dump. We would be a take turns farting into a paper bag to keep us all warm.
        
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        March 30, 2017 8:01pm
- Paulus
  
  More Crap daily – until in a short time we are simply not interested – like hagar who cannot find the right village if there was ever a right one – well some Afghan told him and Manning so – for a price perhaps !
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:12am
- srylands
  
  “Quadriplegic stuck at Wellington Airport doesn’t know where he’s going to sleep.”
  
  Yes. Air New Zealand’s fault. Also the weather ‘havoc’ the North Island is experiencing today. My dictionary tells me havoc means ‘widespread destruction’.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:16am
  - G152
    
    Simple solution. Move the airport.
    Paraparaumu is a good clear choice
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:48am
    - Captain Mainwaring
      
      Bollocks.
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:08am
    - Ed Snack
      
      Move Wellington, around 30 km South would be a good spot….
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:35am
      - double d
        
        5kms would be better ?
        
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        March 31, 2017 1:11am
  - ztev
    
    Planes have been able to land with near zero visibility since the 1960s when they did it for London.
    Just needs airport with the ‘blind landing’ equipment and the planes equippped.
    If only Wellington Airport could find the the $10 mill or so to install it.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:59am
  - Paulus
    
    No, the weather is John Key’s fault.
    
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    March 30, 2017 1:32pm
- VicParking
  
  Government: Tertiary institutions must insure that when they enroll overseas students 85% must be capable of passing.
  MSM: Government insists that tertiary institutions must pass 85% of fee paying students.
  Tertiary institutions: There are to many of us but must keep the gravy train running, enrole and pass as many fee paying students as possible
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:26am
  - Padriv Ustoev
    
    Yes I’m sure the many esteemed languge schools such as the “Royal Golden Horse Acdemy of Cambridge English Learning” will have no problem making sure that 85% of students pass.
    
    You just give them the answers and rake in the 10k plus a year enrollment fee so that after 3-4 years a student can apply for a working Visa a well known back door to Perm Residence and citizenship.
    
    “Royal Golden Horse Academy of Cambridge English Learning” is of course interested in teaching the Queens English not collecting the fees.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:21am
    - Padriv Ustoev
      
      *Queen’s English
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:23am
      - G152
        
        She’s not a Scot 🙂
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:23am
- Rich Prick
  
  The moaning is weapons grade. There are reports of hungry people who weren’t given food, taxi vouchers and hotel accommodation. Did it occur to them that there is a food court there, taxis do take cash and Wellington does have hotels and motels to suit all budgets?
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:00am
  - Ed Snack
    
    RP, to be fair, it was apparently pretty difficult to find anywhere with space in Wellington last night. Easier if you had a lot of $$$ to spare though.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:37am
    - Rich Prick
      
      Yes quite likely, but my point is that these pathetic creatures presumably look after themselves for the other 364 days of the year, yet fall apart in a helpless mess on the one day the media is there to lap it up and breathlessly report the “tragedy” of it all.
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:21am
  - VicParking
    
    Travel insurance???
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:59am
  - GazzaW
    
    C’mon RP, you’re being unreasonable. Why should those punters have to pay? The fog was 100% Air New Zealand’s fault and anyone who had paid $39 for a grab-a-seat to Auckland should be entitled to overnight hotel accommodation and meals while waiting for the fog to clear.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:48am
- godruelf
  
  The only one of these that pisses me off is the Fire Service Levy. Basically because the Fire Service should be paid from general taxation rather than giving the uninsured a free ride.
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:25am
- jonar
  
  Sure you’re not just noticing these stories more because you think the MSM is biased against the government and it’s an election year?
  These types of stories are in the papers often and I doubt everyone views them as criticism of the government. The child was kicked off the bus by Ritchie’s bus company, not the National Party.
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:56am
  - Shaun the Sheep
    
    Doesn’t matter – it was all John Key’s fault.
    Oh wait …
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:56am
- jonar
  
  Also are the media not supposed to inform the public about levy increases etc?
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:59am
  - VicParking
    
    They are, you are right but by using misleading statistics such as 40% in stead of 70c its just a hit job
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:01am
virtualmark

More in the tragic “the Republicans have met the enemy and it is them” file …

Is there anyone here who supports the idea that ISPs should be able to sell your browsing history? Is there anyone here who would want Spark, Vodafone or whoever else selling your internet browsing history to, say, Google or Facebook?

I can’t believe that this idea would have even 1% public support. As the Democrats said in the debate … “leave Capitol Hill for five minutes and find three people on the street who want ISPs collecting and selling their browsing histories”.

So why are the Republicans pushing this through? I am really worried that they are hell-bent on setting themselves up for a world of butt-hurt in 2018.
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March 30, 2017 8:04am
- chris
  
  Grrrr hit report not reply… Links too close together on mobile.
  
  While I agree ISPs should not be able to sell browsing data, they’re not going to have a lot to sell. Something like 50 to 60% of websites now use https, do the ISP can’t see what you are doing specifically, other than DNS lookups and IP addresses you are connecting to.
  
  And Facebook and Google don’t need to buy data from ISPs. Google especially already knows what you’re up to.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:37am
  - virtualmark
    
    https means the ISP can’t see what you type into the page, but they still can see the URL.
    
    Apparently Facebook & Google can track each us across about 10% of the top 100 websites. But buying your browsing history from an ISP would take that 100% of all websites.
    
    Google. Don’t be evil != Don’t be creepy.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:22am
    - chris
      
      No, they cannot see the URL. The whole connection from end to end is encrypted. The browser connects to the IP address using https *before* requesting the URL.
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:03am
    - chris
      
      I’d suggest Google can track you across a lot more websites than that. They can track you via any site that uses Analytics, Adsense and ‘remarketing’, and possibly also all those people (including me) who use Chrome. And all those Facebook widgets on websites help FB follow you around too. It’s mostly so they can both target advertising at you that they think you’re most likely to click. That’s why (and how) often the same ad will follow you around the internet after you’ve visited a particular website.
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:12am
- VicParking
  
  Google and facebook already have your browsing history and already sell it.
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:02am
holysheet

Watch all the hand wringing and winning now from the frogs and the hun with Brexit now officially under way. The bludgers in Europe have lost their cash cow.
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March 30, 2017 8:04am
- cmm
  
  Continental Europe has always been anti-Britain. The only reason they allowed UK into EU was to fleece them.
  
  A pom I know who’s got a PhD in physics and is used to having his snout deep in an EU-funded trough is whining like anything. TO be expected I suppose since he wasn’t even born when Britian was Britain.
  
  “The Uk won’t get any fishing quota if they pull out.”. Umm, no. You won’t have to share Uk fishing waters with Europe so you just make your own quotas.
  
  “All the Uk science funding comes from EU”. Ummm, no. The Uk paid more than their fair share to EU science fund and EU gave some of that back. Just cut out the middle man.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:19am
  - ztev
    
    I was reading a little story about Netherlands attempts to annex parts of Germany up to the Rhine including Cologne after the war. It was to provide a more defensible frontier and as reparations for the destruction ( including the bombing of Rotterdam at the very start of the war).
    Of course those Germans who didnt speak ‘low German’ which is most similar to Dutch would be expelled.
    The main Allies were having none of it, but they did get very minor border adjustments- which they promptly sold back to West Germany 5 years later.
    Anyway as part of the peace treaty Allies including France were allowed to strip German industry of its plant and machinery. The west Germans werent pleased as a lot of it was the small to medium industry which was one of their strengths, so they agreed to a sort of ‘common control’ of their coal mining and steel industry along the border to have the industrial removals stop.
    
    And so the little steps which lead to the common market and then EU began.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:12am
- holysheet
  
  The text editor needs fixing.
  
  7 0
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  March 30, 2017 8:27am
  - Dave Mann
    
    I’m agree i texting edit r sucx
    
    5 0
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    March 30, 2017 9:57am
    - VicParking
      
      Needs a one where spellin mistakes get a red dotted line under them and the hold shows the replace function.
      
      3 0
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      March 30, 2017 10:05am
      - ztev
        
        You can get your own spell check function to work on comments as you type.
        look it up
        eg ‘Spell Checker for Chrome’
        
        2 1
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        March 30, 2017 10:14am
      - Fletch
        
        I use a plugin called Grammarly (for my PC not for phone). It underlines mistakes in red, and just hovering over it suggests the right word which you can then click.
        
        http://www.grammarly.com
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:48am
      - Dave Mann
        
        I’ve just discovered by accident how to make my comments anonymous, using the edit function’s present glitch. Hmm… interesting indeed… I wonder if it will work again?
        
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        March 30, 2017 12:22pm
      - Dave Mann
        
        That didn’t happen again. Must have been a one-off.
        
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        March 30, 2017 1:48pm
calendar girl

PM May’s formal letter to the EU President is beautifully constructed, and is well worth a read: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-39431070
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March 30, 2017 8:06am
- Inandout
  
  Little wonder that English is a universal language.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:16am
  - SGA
    
    🙂 I think that has more to do with the success of British colonization and the success of some of those colonies (in particular, the USA) rather than anything inherent about the English language.
    Spanish is another main language for similar reasons.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:01am
    - kowtow
      
      I saw a bumper sticker once “If you can read this , thank a teacher”
      
      Came a cross a much better quote along the same lines later
      
      “If you can read this in English , thank a soldier”
      
      14 0
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      March 30, 2017 9:49am
      - GoVege
        
        And visit an old soldier in the rest home…
        
        3 0
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        March 30, 2017 11:17am
    - ztev
      
      But English is still the king of languages for its sheer size of vocabulary.
      
      which would you prefer :
      Unabhängigkeitserklärung or
      declaration of independence
      
      9 2
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      March 30, 2017 10:18am
      - SGA
        
        But English is still the king of languages for its sheer size of vocabulary.
        
        But English is still the king of languages in terms of the sheer size of vocabulary.
        There is no “king of languages” in a general sense.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:29am
      - SGA
        
        Damn edit function
        and…
        ztev
        
        which would you prefer…
        
        The one I’m with which I’m familiar, of course. A German speaker might think differently 🙂
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:32am
- virtualmark
  
  Very calm and measured, and wrapped in quite a few olive branches. Will be interesting to see if the European’s response is as calm, or whether they aim for punitive instead.
  
  My take is that ultimately Merkel will rein in the EU autocracy and ensure a free-trade agreement between Europe & the UK. Germany’s economy has a lot to lose if they don’t retain free trade access to the UK.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:18am
lastmanstanding

Holysheet

I have lived on the Northshore since 1979. At that time I could drive the 23 kms to the CBD in “rush hour” in 20 minutes. Now on a good day it takes 75 minutes.

I have paid my taxes and rates to central government and local government for 38 years. Thats what Ive done for them and thats what these bastards have done for me.

Over the time they have been always behind the 8 ball never ahead of the curve as regards future proofing the Northern Motorway. They wait until grid lock sets in and then add a lane for a piddly few kms.

As any engineer will tell you if you are building a 4 lane motorway it aint gonna cost 50% more to make it 6 lanes. But these morons including the current lot whose eyes and ears are painted on dont see that.

Thats reason #4526 I have no respect for central or local pollies nor the idiots they employ.

Wouldnt have them sweeping the floor in my business.
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March 30, 2017 8:10am
- holysheet
  
  Ah well you get who you vote for in this world. Blame your fellow dumb arse voters for this shameful debarcle
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:14am
  - ztev
    
    motorways are soley funded by central government.
    
    local councils have almost no say
    
    Surely you knew this simple fact if you werent complete…… ( careful its be nice day)
    
    1 6
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    March 30, 2017 10:21am
- Paulus
  
  When I lived in Auckland for a number of years it was in Devonport, with a super ferry 12 minutes, and busses to deliver and meet every ferry.
  Chose Devonport, after coming from many years in Wellington, and even more from commuting for hours in London.
  We considered nowhere any better for access, also for children to Uni.
  Of course it was only a small 1910 villa in need of TLC, but close to the beach.
  Three bed, small kitchen, only one toilet/ bathroom, and no garage, but paradise.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:21am
  - Padriv Ustoev
    
    Yes, the modest and not exclusive at all suburb of Devenport. Well known for the working classes and average Aucklanders that make up the population, even 20 years ago.
    
    Very similar to the blue collar suburbs of lets say East Tamaki, Onehunga, Avondale or pretty much anywhere else.
    
    Is that the Devenport you speak of good Sir?
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:32am
  - Lance
    
    A garden shed with a letter box is like $5 million in Devonport
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:45am
- srylands
  
  Yes totally agree. A while back I read an interesting piece on the history of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Opened in 1932. It was designed and constructed to accommodate 8 lanes of motor vehicles plus a double track railway line plus trams plus 2 dedicated pedestrian ways.
  
  It was total over design for the 1930s and some politicians tried to scale it back. The designers argued they were planning for the next century. They won the argument.
  
  Contrast that with the experience of the Auckland Harbour Bridge.
  
  Transmission Gully in Wellington is being built as a four lane road. It should be six.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:26am
  - ztev
    
    Transmission Gully, it will be a 4 lane car park when it opens.
    You are limited by the motorway it connects to at Tawa.
    How many lanes is that ?
    Simple arithmetic explains it all
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:25am
- tf78
  
  The main problem is the intensified housing. People are removing one home and adding three homes, the previously two car section/household now adds at least another four cars to that one section alone. Then we have the stupid bus and cycle lanes. Before all these things everything was doable – how often do you see people using the cycle lanes.
  
  Who’s to blame – not central government but the Council who are too disorganised to spend money on much needed infrastructure to allow houses to be built further out of town. Those idiots councillors can’t see past Queen Street.
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:33am
  - Scott
    
    I would suggest that we need to turn off the immigration tap. For every hundred immigrants how many go to Auckland? Probably 80 or 90?
    Auckland is a very small part of New Zealand and it just cannot fit all the New Zealanders that want to live there plus everybody from everywhere else.
    The government has done fine tuning by allowing extra points for immigrants who want to live outside of Auckland. But I would suggest we stop overseas immigration to Auckland straightaway. It’s just getting too crowded.
    Also they need to build way more houses. Relax the rules and let the free market provide housing.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:26am
- Fletch
  
  An older person once told me that during WWII, the Americans offered to build us a 6-lane motorway in Auckland. We declined because it looked like we’d never need one that big. I guess we weren’t very forward thinking.
  
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  March 30, 2017 11:50am
  - Captain Mainwaring
    
    Another urban myth, like the Rimutaka road tunnel.
    
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    March 30, 2017 12:00pm
    - mikenmild
      
      The Rimutaka Road Tunnel was proposed in the 1950s, as the rail tunnel was being completed, but was deemed too expensive. The last full analysis in the 1980s considered tunnel option, but rather unsurprisingly came down on the side of improving the existing road.
      
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      March 30, 2017 12:25pm
  - cha
    
    Americans offered to build us a 6-lane motorway in Auckland
    
    Apocryphal nonsense, Fletch, that goes with the transmission gully claptrap and the yanks offered to build a port lie.
    
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    March 30, 2017 12:17pm
  - ztev
    
    yes its a myth.
    The Americans got their ideas for motorways from seeing Hitlers autobahns.
    They did have something similar though as a toll road.
    
    “The Pennsylvania Turnpike was planned in the 1930s to improve transportation across the Appalachian Mountains of central Pennsylvania. It used seven tunnels bored for the abandoned South Pennsylvania Railroad project during the 1880s.[78] The highway opened on October 1, 1940 between Irwin and Carlisle as the first long-distance controlled-access highway in the United States” wikipedia
    
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    March 30, 2017 7:26pm
    - Tirebiter
      
      When Eisenhower launched the US interstate highway system in the fearful 50’s with wide pavement, gentle curves, and few or high overpasses to allow oversized vehicles, it was ostensibly for the quick movement of military vehicles around the country.
      I was in grammar school at the time and once a week we did ‘nuclear drills’ where we’d move away from the windows and put our backs against the wall – for protection against atomic bombs. More errant nonsense from government. This was often after we pledged allegiance each morning to the the flag of the USA – which is an odd thing for impressionable children to do outside of a totalitarian state. Make of that what you will.
      
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      March 31, 2017 3:32am
Paulus Gnome

Is this who we are?

Two sentenced after children beaten, starved and neglected while caregivers smoked meth

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11827845

This is not the majority of parents in New Zealand, however, there are just enough of these ferals among us for me to be ashamed.

Nia Glasse, Moko Rangitoheriri, Chris & Cru Kahui, almost ad infinitum.
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March 30, 2017 8:12am
- kowtow
  
  No it’s not who we are.
  
  It is Aotearoa.
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:00am
- Inandout
  
  But we are told mokopuna are much better off living with farnow. Now here is a screamer, the Maori dictionary describes taitamaiti as a child, but as an example they say:
  
  1. (noun) child.
  
  Ko te Īnia nāna nei te kōhuru he taitamaiti. The Indian who committed the murder was a child.
  
  Why use ‘Indian’ FGS?
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:06am
- Dave Mann
  
  No this is not who ‘we’ are. Its who the bottom feeders (many of them Maoris) are.
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:24am
  - GoVege
    
    Met a 22 year old Maori girl with a 7 year old son recently. .thankfully her only one.
    Also a Maori solo mum in her 40s holding a newborn baby…said it was her 10th.
    All gifts from God I’m sure…paid for by yous.
    
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    March 30, 2017 11:29am
    - Longknives
      
      When I worked at WINZ many years ago I knew of a Maori Girl in her mid 20s with seven..(Though from memory two or three were already in CYPS Care)
      I got into trouble for denying her an ‘Emergency’ Grant because she was swearing and abusing me..
      Great job that.
      
      9 1
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      March 30, 2017 7:33pm
      - GoVege
        
        With the birthrate of many Maori, it’s a wonder they are still only 15% of the population.
        Perhaps the neglect and abuse they suffer leads to a high death rate.
        Many years ago I read in the Listener that a Maori church leader named Ihaka had been telling Maori to have as many children as possible.
        The reason: to outbreed the Pakeha.
        The unintended consequences no doubt are the stats for Maori child deaths.
        Ironically the latest case before the courts involves a little (deceased ) boy named Ihaka.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:01pm
- GoVege
  
  Talk about the archetypal cruel stepmother.
  What on earth happened to their real/ birth mother?
  
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  March 30, 2017 11:26am
- GoVege
  
  Don’t let’s write them off as “ferals”, anybody brought up in these huge families would struggle to survive.
  Our services failed them also.
  Nobody told the Kahui twins’ parents they were entitled to state-paid help with 3 children under 2.
  James Whakaruru was sent home with a 15 year old mother who had recently attempted suicide.
  But the #1 problem is the Maori people declining to use contraception.
  And “leaders” like Dame Tariana claiming that their 13-17 year olds having 4 times the birth rate of other races is not a problem but “our fertility”.
  
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  March 30, 2017 12:47pm
- jims_whare
  
  They may have been beaten, starved, and neglected but at least they weren’t smacked so we are making great strides in progress since Sue Bradford’s visionary piece of legislation.
  
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  March 30, 2017 2:35pm
Keeping Stock

Rosemary McLeod hits the nail on the head:

The old short-back-and-sides with brilliantine to finish, once worn by older men, harked back to the last war. Reluctant heroes of their generation, they fought fascism and returned with memories they’d rather bury than share. I don’t think anyone imagined they had never seen war crimes, or doubted they occurred on both sides of the war, but it would have been churlish to ask. You can’t give people lethal weapons and tell them not to use them, or have a war without a body count, much of it innocent civilians, who we call collateral damage. Killing people is what war is.

Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson’s book, Hit & Run, accuses our Defence Force of a cover-up after civilian deaths in Afghanistan seven years ago.

Stephenson previously produced a documentary about it, and has been involved in extended libel action with Defence which was settled out of court. Hager has several books to his credit, all of them, I gather, springing from the idea of cover-ups and the public’s right to know everything it has a mind to.

Some books are released to media in advance of publication, giving the opportunity to follow up allegations. This book was not, a guarantee that it would receive saturation coverage, while anyone who doubted its claims would look as if they were trying to hide something. Hager knows how to play the media, which laps up his every utterance.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/comment/columnists/90926475/Rosemary-McLeod-The-drive-to-humiliate-the-young-and-those-who-go-to-war?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

The admission by Hager and Stephenson yesterday that they had the wrong village, but that everything else they wrote was right was so far-fetched and ludicrous it bordered on comedy. They are scrambling to retain the last vestiges of their credibility, with only the media now believing anything they say.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/90973275/hit-and-run-authors-concede-they-got-the-location-for-a-raid-wrong-in-their-book

It’s noticeable that the cries from politicians for an inquiry have dried up completely. Little and the Greens may not have much going for them, but I suspect they know a dead horse when they see one.
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March 30, 2017 8:18am
- holysheet
  
  your average voter has no time for this shit. Who care about what happened to some ragheads in a shitty village in the back of that turd infested place.
  
  It’s called collateral damage for a reason.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:22am
  - Keeping Stock
    
    I agree holysheet. Hitt and Run is going to be an even more spectacular failure in changing the government than Dirty Politics was. No wonder the opposition pollies have given him the flick.
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:25am
    - mikenmild
      
      You agree that raghead lives don’t matter?
      
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      March 30, 2017 8:34am
      - rightoverlabour
        
        Absolutely, as in Raghead = Terrorist. And their supporters too. Our lives don’t matter to them, why should we be so concerned about theirs? Further, if you love ragheads so much, why don’t you bugger off and live with them? Then you could possibly witness SAS operations first hand, unlike Hager et al that rely on “sources”.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:01am
      - ztev
        
        Tell us again which country was nato occupying and yet the main country the 9/11 terrorists came from wasnt touched.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:28am
      - itstricky
        
        Absolutely, as in Raghead = Terrorist. And their supporters too. Our lives don’t matter to them, why should we be so concerned about theirs?
        
        Except that he (holysheet) said “collateral damage is to be expected”
        
        Can’t believe 28 people up ticked him. As usual, some sad sack losers here, or just asses being deliberately provocative.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:50am
      - GoVege
        
        Hopefully the latter, itstricky.
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:34am
- Keeping Stock
  
  Whoops; stuffed the blockquote command up, and the edit function is still busted. Everything below the link to Rosemary McLeod’s op-ed is my words 😎
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:24am
- cmm
  
  Heck, even Campbell has dropped it because it is too smelly.
  
  It was a hit job. And a very incompetent one too.
  
  Some fact checking is very simple: eg. making sure a village is in the right place, since it is pretty hard to move a village. Hager and his buddy got that wrong.
  
  Some fact checking is very hard: eg. the he said/she said stuff, the identity of soldiers, the cause of death in a place where shootings are rife. Hager is adamant he got that right.
  
  Somehow I doubt it. If you can’t get the simple stuff right, then what chance do you have getting the complicated stuff right?
  
  Hager is certainly keen to rake the muck, but I think he was duped by people highly motivated to spin a yarn.
  
  In Afghanistan the average income is about $500 per year. A nice sob story could end up with a multi-million dollar payout making the whole village pretty rich.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:32am
  - Rachael Membery
    
    I think that you are very generous calling Hager a dupe.
    
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    March 30, 2017 11:33am
- VicParking
  
  I notice that the failing newspapers online version does not have a “Hit & Miss” article this morning. Maybe they are at last reading the writing on the wall.
  Red rado however are still dragging up has beens to back their one sided opinion.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:33am
  - mikenmild
    
    The coverage by Toby Manhire in The Spinoff is continuing, and is quite good.
    
    2 18
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    March 30, 2017 8:36am
    - Keeping Stock
      
      Ah yes; the objective journalist Toby Manhire, writing in that last bastion of objectivity, The Spinoff.
      
      Did you know they’ve turned the comments function off at The Spinoff mikenmild, lest they get wind that someone out there might not share their rose-tinted view of the world?
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:05am
- Peter
  
  The “Hit” was done by authors, but it appears the “Run” is being done by media, Greens and Labour.
  
  This book would be lucky to hit the $1 clearance bin.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:49am
- niggly
  
  When Hager and Stephenson released their book last week, there was mention of compensation for the villagers (which Deborah Manning has been involved with all along).
  
  The puzzling thing I thought at the time was normally ISAF and contributing countries paid compensation when villagers are killed and property damaged.
  
  So is there a reason why the villagers didn’t approach ISAF at the time to discuss compensation (in particular with the US, since it is alleged the US Apache gunships did most of the damage)?
  
  So then why bring it up now?
  
  Or did they at the time, then Stephenson came along looking to booster his previous investigative reports and the villagers took advantage of that? Ok maybe I’m being a wee bit facetious with this question but why has the book authors (and Manning) made this a “NZ” issue not a “US” issue to resolve?
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:58am
oldpark

Get it right, Mr Fake News HAGER. when you set out to smear and denigrate our brave NZ soldiers. What a web you have weaved when you deliberately set out to deceive. You couldnt even get the correct location,when you set up an unprovoked verbal assault and lies on NZs finest. Seems the so called Media reef fish went along with your fake news and lies. Leading the charge was a litle boy lost called Jack something or other from another fake news outfit called TVNZ. He also had a pack of Hager the Horrible sycophants. From Mr 7% Little ,to a few other clowns ,like Vernon Small from Dom Post,and not forgetting the verbal ratbags from the $32,000,000 taxpayer funded Radio New Zealand. Interesting to see Hagers sycophants are now running scared,as they are finding out,they have been supporting rumour, lies and innuendo,from the purveyor and printer of stolen emails,from another, manufactured fake news book.
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March 30, 2017 8:20am
- VicParking
  
  Red Radio are sinking fast but are still biting the hand that is holding them from drowning in their own marxist claptrap.
  
  34 2
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  March 30, 2017 8:38am
  - doggone7
    
    They’ve been on air for 178 hours in the past week. What was the ‘marxist claptrap’ you heard?
    
    Or don’t you listen to them? In which case you can say there was marxist claptrap?
    
    Or you heard marxist claptrap the last time you did listen? Who said what and how long was that segment compared to the stuff that was not marxist claptrap? And was there any capitalist claptrap in that particular 178 hour time span?
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:48am
Andrei

Russian expansionism -oh wait this is yet another Nation whose citizens have died under NATO bombs within living memory

Non dare call it imperialism!

Remember the Habsburgs
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March 30, 2017 8:26am
- stephen2d
  
  Not many bombs fell on Montenegro, and Milo (although a big crook) and 50% of population is quite happy to join NATO – it is only the Russians that are causing dramas there.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:42am
  - Andrei
    
    “Not many bombs fell on Montenegro
    
    Tell that to the families of those who died and those who were maimed
    
    NATO, the North Atlantic ~~Treaty~~ Terrorist Organization is the biggest purveyor of death and human misery on the planet and a cancer on humanity
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:14am
Chuck Bird

The woman from Rape Crisis is concerned about the lying girl not the real victim. Bloody feminazi.
What is unclear is whether the girl was 13 in 2013 or is 13 now.

13yo admits lying in rape case after defendant spent 10 months in jail

A Rape Crisis Dunedin community educator Anna Hoek-Sims said false allegations made it harder for real sexual-abuse victims to come forward because most feared they would not be believed.

She stressed only about 2 per cent of cases that made it to court were based on fabricated claims and said it was important to consider why it happened.

”I think we need to keep in mind that people who make false complaints often make them for another reason, such as personal issues, health issues or even past history of sexual violence and often when something like this happens, the person can be forgotten in the fury that follows a false accusation.

”I hope that in this case, the person receives the support they need.”

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11828283
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March 30, 2017 8:28am
- fernglas
  
  “only 2% of cases that made it to court were based on false complaints” ONLY 2%? That’s probably around 20 falsely accused people per year, of which probably 10 are convicted. No doubt sexual abuse is endemic in this country and needs to be dealt with, but are the Courts the best way?
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:36am
  - Chuck Bird
    
    “No doubt sexual abuse is endemic in this country and needs to be dealt with, but are the Courts the best way?”
    
    Are you a lawyer?
    
    2 1
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    March 30, 2017 8:48am
- cmm
  
  “She stressed only about 2 per cent of cases that made it to court were based on fabricated claims”
  
  Based on what stats?
  
  But it is certainly sick that these “victims” mess up other people’s lives and don’t face the full force of perjury charges. They are still chalked up as victims.
  
  The bloke who sat in jail for 10 months… Yeah well, he’s male so he was probably going to rape anyway or probably already has and got away with it, or raped someone in another life, so it is just poetic justice.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:38am
- Padriv Ustoev
  
  I’d be pretty dark if i was tarred a rapist and then spent 10 months in rape me in the ass prison.
  
  I’m guessing there are no repercussions for the girl? Is there anything in law in NZ for perjury and lies in court?
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:40am
  - cmm
    
    Got to keep the victim narrative alive.
    
    She will be given hugs and puppies and a male doll and a pin so that she can work through how males have harmed her.
    
    25 1
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    March 30, 2017 8:43am
- Chuck Bird
  
  Judge Crosbie says the trial process worked. I say the judge has a strange view of justice. How much compensation does he think the real victim should get.
  
  Though scenarios like it were not unheard of, the judge said, ”what you’ve seen is out of the ordinary and what we’d regard as an exceptional case”.
  
  ”I’m satisfied we now know the truth. What you have is a trial process that’s worked,” he said.
  
  http://i.stuff.co.nz/timaru-herald/news/85715258/Conviction-over-false-rape-complaint-following-sex-with-minor
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:29am
  - itstricky
    
    I think the real story here is there’s a bunch of quoting of the MSM again.
    
    I thought the general consensus amongst KB was that they were commie, leftie, feminazi conspiracy rags that only existed to persecute the white male.
    
    Other stuff happens in the world and is reported on. Fancy that. Who would’ve guessed?
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:56am
- Chuck Bird
  
  Unlike David Bain this man has been exonerated. Should he get an ex gratia payment? I do not have any special knowledge of this case but it seems like the two complainants were living in the same house possibly sisters. It they were two separate complainants that would seem a big co-incidence.
  
  No compensation for man who spent 10 months in jail after false rape accusation
  
  http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11828634
  
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  March 30, 2017 2:40pm
Dafixeruppa

I get really frustrated with the Green leaning people, not to be confused with the green party supporters, but those that genuinely believe that they need to take actions to protect the planet.
There is no point in getting into the argument about whether the planet needs saving or not and this rant is not related to the argument.
When you do the minimum of research you find that things like electric cars for example, while driving them does reduce CO2 and other pollutants, it only benefits NZ which is already relatively low in these (apart from Auckland that we hope pollutes itself into the sea).
Take Electric cars, no pollutants from driving them, but in the manufacture, huge energy requirements to make (Aluminium bodies take more energy to make http://time.com/money/3432529/tesla-electric-environmentally-friendly-aluminum/) huge Lithium requirements, which cause destruction to the areas where it is mined (http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/everyday-myths/does-hybrid-car-production-waste-offset-hybrid-benefits1.htm)
So by promoting a holier than thou attitude and trying to save the planet, Electric car owners simply move the problem to someone else’s back yard and in fact increase the damage in those areas.
Sorry this is not as clearly written as my normal comments, but I am limited with time this morning, deadlines to meet.
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March 30, 2017 8:29am
- VicParking
  
  The life cycle of an electric vehicle is not long enough to give it a “carbon credit” however evan if 100% of its electricity comes from renewable sources.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:41am
- Lance
  
  Interesting that Airbus boosts it’s aircraft are made from Aluminium produced from renewable energy.
  As in Tiwai Point smelter powered by Manapouri
  
  Then the next thing Rio Tinto are threatening to close it down if they don’t receive great deals from the Govt
  
  Yea right
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:55am
  - peterwn
    
    The Smelter like any commercial venture is continually under review. There are sets of circumstances under which it could be mothballed or even closed down. Factors include aluminium demand, worldwide smelter capacity, performance relative to Rio’s ‘basket’ of smelters, the need for non recurring maintenance, shipping costs, electricity costs. Rio will ‘screw down’ what factors it can with employment and electricity the main ones that concern NZ. Rio will also attempt to screw governments for what subsidies it can as they would tend to compete to keep smelters on their home patches. This involves shrewd PR, raise awareness that closure means loss of jobs and an alleged electricity glut so there is pressure on the Government to subsidise. There is a moral hazard with subsidies – the unions can threaten industrial action knowing that the Government will indirectly meet demands via subsidies (similar with freezing workers in years gone by – the unions knew the farmers would lobby the Government for farm subsidies which effectively translated into bloated wages for freezing workers). All in all the outfit who wins this game is the one who is well informed and has the harder balls. There will be a group in Meridian who has a sound knowledge of the global aluminium situation and who can discern real threats from bullshit. Meridian also has a fallback – it has studied the consequences of closure and the effect on the NZ electricity market. It knows how much Manapouri power could be stranded by transmission constraints (not as bad as one may think) and with Transpower could have a ‘ready to go’ plan to beef up transmission from Invercargill to Roxburgh.
    My gut feeling is the future of Tiwai smelter is safe without the Government having to grant more than minimal subsidies nor Meridian having to provide electricity at bargain basement prices.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:34am
Chuck Bird

Why are these violent young thugs not charged in adult court with aggravated assault? The 14 year old victim could have died. What this the Commissioner of Children have to say about the victim? I wonder if these girls ever got any parental discipline.

Ashburton College rules out ‘instant expulsion’ after violent school attack, Youth Aid now investigating

https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/ashburton-college-rules-instant-expulsion-after-violent-school-attack-youth-aid-now-investigating
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March 30, 2017 8:45am
- peterwn
  
  ‘Instant expulsion’ – as the Principal pointed out this is not within his power. He has no doubt suspended the pupils in question(which he has the power to do) pending a special Board meeting to consider expulsion for which due notice would be required. The parents might also ‘lawyer up’ so the College probably needs to engage a lawyer to cross the t’s, dot the i’s and be present at the Board meeting to advise the Board as need be. This all takes some days to organise and urgency is not essential if the alleged offenders are not attending school. Short circuiting procedure leaves the College open to judicial review, bearing the cost of this process and egg on the Principal’s and College’s faces.
  
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  March 30, 2017 12:24pm
  - Chuck Bird
    
    That may be true Peter. But as I said why have these young female thugs not been charged in adult court for aggravated assault? Why is the Children’s Commissioner not saying anything about the victim.
    
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    March 30, 2017 2:01pm
Kimbo

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT:

It has come to my attention that certain of you among the Kiwiblog community are confused by the fast-gaining-meme-status Kimbo’s law: “in blogworld the validity of an argument is in inverse proportion to the excessive and unnecessary use of adverbs”. I refer, for example to the following contribution from our resident anti-religionist, nasska

The adverb has been denigrated! The adverb must be defended! The Philistines who would condemn us to verbs without qualification should dismount their hobby-horses

Instance Fitzgerald’s iconic final sentence of The Great Gatsby? Would “born back ceaselessly into the past” be improved by removing the word ceaselessly?

Or what of the memorable opening line of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice:

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

Should you disagree then make your comment…..immediately, boldly, and profoundly. ?

March 29, 2017 5:39pm

http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2017/03/soles_for_satan.html

No, nasska, Kimbo’s law does not disagree with F Scott Fitzgerald, nor Miss Austen. And far from “denigrating” the adverb, Kimbo’s law celebrates it, cherishes it, and elevates to its proper station – when an adverb is good it enhances meaning. For example, “born back ceaselessly into the past” reinforces the theme within ‘The Great Gatsby’ that humans are unable to move beyond the past. Also, when an adverb is necessary it captures requisite nuance. such as Miss Austen’s satirical, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

But what Kimbo’s law does take aim at is adverbs that are shills. Like, for example, if Nicky Hager were to implore “Surely the government should order an inquiry into the allegations my research has uncovered…”. No Nicky, there is nothing “surely” about it, and that adverb is a cheap rhetorical trick, nothing but a used-car salesman in a polyester suit, using the supposed certitude from an unwarranted adverb to try and sell a dodgy set of goods, or a specious idea. Remember the quick test – if you can remove an adverb and there is little or no appreciable change in meaning, then kick it out – it isn’t paying the rent (yes, ok, I’m now mangling metaphors, but that meme is already taken).

So, in summary:

Use your adverbs well, so just look at them and sigh and know they love you
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March 30, 2017 8:48am
- kowtow
  
  And don’t forget your fullstops.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:55am
  - holysheet
    
    It would help if the edit function was working.
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:09am
  - Kimbo
    
    Hah! I see your pedant and raise you twenty:
    
    When using verse, “END punctuations like FULL STOP, and COMMA can be done away with, if you so desire”, as I did.
    
    https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/understanding-poetry-place-punctuation-poem-kukogho-iruesiri-samson
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:09am
    - kowtow
      
      Could of ( haha , hats off to stephie ) called me for starting a sentence with a conjunction .
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:19am
    - Kimbo
      
      stephie calling anyone for punctuation beggars belief! Then again, it is stephieboy, and “foolish and brazen” applies. 😉
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:26am
- SGA
  
  But such rules are open to abuse, Kimbo. I thought that calling out someone yesterday for using “deliberately” (which, to me anyway, did convey extra meaning in that context) was the thin edge of the wedge. 🙂 🙂
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:07am
  - Kimbo
    
    Hah! Been taking lessons from Nicky Hager, SGA? Your weaving of a tale based on selective facts is telling. You omitted to mention that in the post in question, “deliberately”was linked in immediate proximity to “very adroitly”. Three adverbs in one phrase?!
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:06am
    - SGA
      
      Although “very adroitly” may have been “excessive and unnecessary”, the “deliberately” did convey a useful meaning (in my mind, anyway).
      It’s for your own good, Kimbo – power corrupts 🙂
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:17am
      - Kimbo
        
        Unbeliever! Power may corrupt, but megalomania brooks no dissent. I quote RJA’s original post (http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2017/03/soles_for_satan.html, MARCH 29, 2017 4:22PM) to give full context, and then apply the simple test, does it give the same meaning if the adverbs are omitted?:
        
        …Anything an adult tells a child gets accepted as fact (which has good reason in parenting), but this gets used ~~very adroitly and deliberately~~ by religions to ensure expansion of the flock, and assure them of blind lifetime obedience.
        
        Nope. No change. The later phrases, buttressed with powerful and emphatic verbs, “to ensure expansion of the flock, and assure them of blind lifetime obedience” imply that the “used” was done “deliberately”. Hence it is unnecessary, and, in tandem with two other adverbs, excessive.
        
        QED
        
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        March 30, 2017 11:45am
      - SGA
        
        Now that you’ve dredged up the original, I see your point, but at the time I took those more as a justification for the adverb rather than a replacement.
        In any case, it’s not healthy to let you run amok without the occasional challenge – Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
        
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        March 30, 2017 7:41pm
      - Kimbo
        
        gurgle…choke…gasp..hoist by…own…petard
        
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        March 30, 2017 8:47pm
- B.L.Zeebub
  
  What is this adverb, you speak of?
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:09am
  - B.L.Zeebub
    
    Shirley, you jest?
    
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    March 30, 2017 9:10am
    - SGA
      
      Don’t call me Shirley
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:14am
- Dafixeruppa
  
  As a fellow wordsmith (who falls down repeatedly), I applaud you sir.
  It is simply remarkable that the increased redundancy of the increasingly common adverbage in redundant type prose is overly and unnecessarily utilised in relatively meaningless conversation…
  🙂
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:56am
  - Kimbo
    
    …repeatedly…simply…increasingly …overly…unnecessarily…relatively…
    
    I thank you, Dafixeruppa. And to clarify, deliberate overuse of adverbs for hyperbolic or satirical purposes is not a breach of Kimbo’s law.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:11am
    - SPC
      
      Holding councils to account, proposing reform of our property regulatory system, proper form in use of language to make a case, informing us of the threat to the white race nations originating from the Frankfurt school (and its related nefarious Jewish origin), we can never, and I mean never ever, be reminded enough about these vital concerns – not while this blog exists and this century continues, or those responsible (end their heroic quests to enlighten us all) go to their graves.
      
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      March 30, 2017 4:25pm
    - calendar girl
      
      Should not “Kimbo’s law” be rendered in print as “Kimbo’s Law”?
      
      Gives it greater visual recognition, and enhanced authority.
      
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      March 30, 2017 7:14pm
      - Kimbo
        
        Ah, calendar girl, you have leapt to the list of my favourites on Kiwiblog. A thousand blessings upon your head. When I come into my meme and adverb-economic kingdom, I will remember you.
        
        Nonetheless, as I am a humble man (cough!), I can but acknowledge that “law” in “Kimbo’s law” is not a proper noun. Nor does it justify an uncial commencement, as follows:
        
        A thorny aspect of capitalization: where does it stop? When does the Iraq war become the Iraq War? Why is the legendary Hope Diamond not the Hope diamond? Everyone writes New York City, so why does the Associated Press Stylebook recommend New York state? There aren’t always easy formulas or logical explanations. Research with reference books and search engines is the best strategy.
        
        In the case of brand names, companies are of little help, because they capitalize any word that applies to their merchandise. Domino’s Pizza or Domino’s pizza? Is it Ivory Soap or Ivory soap, a Hilton Hotel or a Hilton hotel? Most writers don’t capitalize common nouns that simply describe the products (pizza, soap, hotel)…
        
        http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/capital.asp
        
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        March 30, 2017 8:43pm
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        spelling mistake?
        
        Kimbo’s lore
        
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        March 30, 2017 8:48pm
      - Kimbo
        
        …whereas those who thwart or confuse the upward march of “Kimbo’s law” to meme status will be remembered. Think you have a problem with the temporarily (justified adverb) absent yet obsessive griff, Maggy? I counsel you not to trifle with me 😉
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:04pm
      - Tirebiter
        
        You guys seem to be a bit fixated on the adverb. You go on and on about it as though you’re onto something meaningful. You’re not. Why is that? Suggesting that there is a ‘law’, in this case ‘Kimbo’s Law’ – there I said it – that determines the value of one’s arguments based on what CLASS of words one uses is nonsense – even in the nuthouse that is blogworld. Those who want to control your language want to control your mind. That is the easiest way to dismiss an argument without having to address it. It’s an old desire among those with authoritarian personalities. And it is the certain sign of a fearful and inadequate cognitive capacity that cannot or will not deal with subtlety and can only deal with a binary world of black and white instead of the myriad grays the analog world comes in. It’s idiocy on parade – and so many idiots marching.
        
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        March 31, 2017 6:37am
Peter

Populism/conservatism is the new punk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmE0M9TOIxU

Good point that the left can’t be both the dominant culture AND the counter culture. It’s the reason so many left-wing comedians just aren’t funny – they are pretending to be subversive whilst being fully paid-up members of teh establishment.

These days, being rebellious means attacking the lefts sacred cows.
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March 30, 2017 8:58am
kowtow

Well Angela , how’s that multiculti thingy going?

“A protest by Muslim parents against a gay man looking after their children at a Kindergarten has led to a public debate in the liberal capital city.”

https://www.thelocal.de/20170329/muslim-parents-protest-after-gay-berlin-man-hired-to-raise-their-kids
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March 30, 2017 9:15am
- Longknives
  
  Muslim ‘Rights’ outweigh even Gay Rights in the bizarre Left Mindset.
  Hence the Left seemingly have no problem with horrors like Gay People being thrown off buildings or slaughtered in Nightclubs.
  Just so long as we don’t ‘Offend’ Muslims…
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:37am
- Shaun the Sheep
  
  Is it Stand-Up night again?
  You couldn’t make this stuff up
  NFOCLPMSL
  
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  March 30, 2017 5:00pm
Michael

To those complaining about the edit function not working. Has anyone emailed DPF? I mean it’s not as if he is sitting on his bum looking at comments made on kiwiblog.
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March 30, 2017 9:15am
kowtow

How the fuck can these people be allowed to operate?

Their presence at sea only encourages the migration and the deaths , surely that must be illegal.

“Early on Wednesday the Golfo Azzurro, a humanitarian vessel, rescued about 400 migrants – mainly from Morocco, Algeria, Libya, Gambia and Bangladesh – including 16 women and two children.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/29/dozens-feared-dead-mediterranean-boy-found-clinging-debris
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March 30, 2017 9:27am
- Manolo
  
  The Italians are sick of this invasion, but the government, bound by EU laws and regulations, is utterly paralised by fear.
  
  The hordes continue to arrive.
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:55am
Ross12

Well done to the Brits and the UK Govt.
Now Article 50 has been triggered it will be onwards and upwards for the UK. I’m sure it won’t be easy to untangle the links but it will be worthwhile for the UK in the end.
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March 30, 2017 9:42am
cha

Any of our mob on Beijing’s payroll?.

Despite such a requirement, the affidavit alleges, Claiborne failed to report repeated contacts with two intelligence agents of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), even though these agents provided tens of thousands of dollars in gifts and benefits to Claiborne and her family over five years. According to the affidavit, the gifts and benefits included cash wired to Claiborne’s USAA account, an Apple iPhone and laptop computer, Chinese New Year’s gifts, meals, international travel and vacations, tuition at a Chinese fashion school, a fully furnished apartment, and a monthly stipend. Some of these gifts and benefits were provided directly to Claiborne, the affidavit alleges, while others were provided through a co-conspirator.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/state-department-employee-arrested-and-charged-concealing-extensive-contacts-foreign-agents
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March 30, 2017 10:04am
aquataur

Another example of erosion of individual property rights and a fee fueled bureaucracy

I live on a lifestyle property an hour north of Auckland’s CBD but unfortunately (due to Rodney Hide including Rodney at the last minute with no mandate from Rodney ratepayers) am part of the cluster-fu*k of the Super City

Due to my adult daughter recently returning to live with us along with her 2 children, I want to convert one of the rooms in the house to a kitchen. Very happy to apply and pay for a building consent to ensure drainage, etc is all done properly but lo and behold, the greedy fee suckers want a resource consent and for me to pay a development levy as apparently I am adding to the infrastructure needed to support the property

Hello – I have my own water supply and septic tank, and the gravel road to the property gets graded once every two years if I’m lucky. Anyway, the same number of people live there whether I have one or two kitchens.

Its my property, what I want to do does not affect anyone else or impact on the environment but a bunch of greedy incompetent officials are using the RMA to extract $ from me and provide nought in return.
Interested if anyone else found a way through this issue
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March 30, 2017 10:13am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  Sell property to local iwi for a contractually defined period and get them to do the renovations? After all the rules are different for them. 😉
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:27am
  - aquataur
    
    God No !
    
    They will want a cultural assessment of my proposal and that will just add more snouts in the trough
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:43am
    - itstricky
      
      You weren’t expecting a serious, non cynical reply, were you?
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:58am
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  I’m firmly of the view that Rodney only wanted Rodney in the Super City because it bears his name.
  But the main question is: would you be having the same issues irrespective of which local authority is involved?
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:58am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  I long ago heard of a business that got into shit with IRD and sold business to Mongrel Mob or similar, they destroyed financial record and laughed in IRD’s faces.
  
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  March 30, 2017 12:24pm
- wiseowl
  
  It’s not the RMA that is the problem.
  The RMA does not say you have to do these things , it is most likely a RULE in the plan .
  The council does not have to have all these rules and in your case what you want to do should be a permitted activity.
  It is the bureacrats that convince the councillors that all these rules are required and they agree usually without question.
  So tell your councillor to change the rules and see how you get on.
  
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  March 30, 2017 12:30pm
- Paulus Gnome
  
  Do it. Seek forgiveness rather than permission.
  
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  March 30, 2017 1:13pm
Manolo

The fat slob goes over the top on Twitter:
https://www.infowars.com/michael-moore-says-trump-will-cause-human-extinction/

Liberal propagandist Michael Moore said Monday afternoon on Twitter that President Donald Trump will cause the “extinction of human life on earth.”
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March 30, 2017 10:17am
- G152
  
  I feel sure he (Trump) could start with one greasy obese foul mouthed leftie just to see how it worked.
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:34am
- SPC
  
  Did he mean it literally, or he is just integrating with/assimilating the new twitter speak style of POTUS Trump?
  
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  March 30, 2017 4:43pm
- SPC
  
  And remember if this was the 20thC, the heads of Moral Majority or Christian Coalition would have said electing a man onto his third wife would bring western civilisation to an end.
  
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  March 30, 2017 4:45pm
Hugh Pavletich

The Auckland housing market is on the verge of losing all the capital gains it made in the last 12 months | interest.co.nz

https://www.interest.co.nz/property/86771/auckland-housing-market-verge-losing-all-capital-gains-it-made-last-12-months

By Greg Ninness

The Auckland housing market is on the verge of having all of the capital gains it made in the last 12 months wiped out.

Prices of Auckland properties have fallen so much in the last few months that median prices are within a hair’s breadth of going into negative territory on an annual basis.

They may already be there. … read more via hyperlink above …

Performance Urban Planning
… just updated …
http://www.performanceurbanplanning.org/
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March 30, 2017 10:36am
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  Isn’t this what you were wishing for Hugh?
  Can’t have it both ways.
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:59am
  - All_on_Red
    
    National Governement done a great job then Hugh
    You must be very happy.
    ?
    
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    March 30, 2017 11:27am
- Jack5
  
  If Auckland property prices keep slipping, how soon will it be before the banksters are sweating?
  
  It’s a while since they were pumping out mortgages for over 100 per cent of property price (they were covering mortgage and transfer fees, etc). But if in the last three years the banksters were lending 75 per cent on house purchases, does that mean if property prices fall 30 per cent the banksters will be in pain?
  
  If they are, what happens then? Our farmers and other businesses need bank finance to function, and more than 90 per cent of this bank finance comes from our Aussie banks.
  
  (This post done under http and then edited by hopping into https – wasn’t required to re-login.)
  
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  March 30, 2017 12:09pm
  - SPC
    
    People are stuck with mortgage repayments regardless of the property value.
    
    What would concern banks more is higher interest rates than people can pay.
    
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    March 30, 2017 4:59pm
- Lance
  
  Well the houses in our area (Western Heights , Henderson) are still selling higher and higher in value so I don’t know where you got this dropping prices info from?
  House hovering around $950K are now over selling $1M… yes selling!
  
  Doesn’t bother me one way or the other, but dropping it is not in our neck of the woods.
  
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  March 30, 2017 3:21pm
Manolo

Radical do-gooders in action:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4358710/Up-12-activists-break-security-Stansted.html

Up to 12 activists broke through security at Stansted Airport tonight and chained themselves together on the runway to stop failed asylum seekers being deported.

The left-wing activists were trying to stop a flight taking up to 100 immigrants back to Nigeria and Ghana.
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March 30, 2017 10:42am
Manolo

Eternal chant. The Russians, those bloody Russians:
http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/29/top-dem-senator-is-concerned-russia-made-hillary-lose-key-states/

The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee said Wednesday that he has seen reports which make him concerned that Russian interference targeted Hillary Clinton in key swing states.
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March 30, 2017 10:47am
- Inandout
  
  Tucker gives the Dem snowflakes a hard time on his Fox segments, by slowly dismantling their tenuous arguments. The Dems seem to speak like excited teenagers, their voices rising to a crescendo when they realise they are losing the debate.
  
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  March 30, 2017 3:45pm
Jack5

Manolo, good post.

Far from the first time we’ve had a Russian scare. There are remnants of gun emplacements built in NZ habours in the 1880s because of Russian-bogeyman fears.

A tiny West Coast newspaper is reported to have thundered in an editorial: “We have repeatedly warned the Czar.”

Here’s a Wikipedia link about this scare, which saw the NZ Government import artillery for port fortification:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastal_fortifications_of_New_Zealand
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March 30, 2017 12:21pm
- Kea
  
  Jack, that should get one KB commenter excited, as they endlessly propagate propaganda advocating the recommencement of the cold-war and Hitlers plan to exterminate the Slavic peoples.
  
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  March 30, 2017 12:26pm
cha

Remember when wingnuts used say Obama and other LEADERS have often exploited CHILDREN as emotional props!!!!

Good times.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C7-bOEaV4AIKOHN.jpg

Fletch

Propaganda 101.

Obama using children as tools in his press conference to read out their “letters” about guns and gun control.

http://youtu.be/0NBt6ya04uM

There’s another 3 videos as well

http://hotair.com/archives/2013/01/17/its-come-to-this-white-house-releases-videos-of-young-kids-asking-obama-for-more-gun-control/

Leaders have often exploited CHILDREN as emotional props.

http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2013/01/general_debate_19_january_2013.html/comment-page-1#comment-1081953
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March 30, 2017 12:27pm
- All_on_Red
  
  Chuck Schumer cough cough
  http://video.foxnews.com/v/5378178429001/?#sp=show-clips
  
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  March 30, 2017 2:21pm
- doggone7
  
  “Leaders have often exploited CHILDREN as emotional props.”
  
  Not in NZ though!
  
  http://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/arts/576352/John-Keys-street-of-shame-in-Auckland-play
  
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  March 30, 2017 5:55pm
Kea

The Obama regime:
“Obama Has Deported More People Than Any Other President”
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/obamas-deportation-policy-numbers/story?id=41715661

President Trump:
“US judge grants Singaporean blogger’s asylum request”
http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/asia/90850036/us-judge-grants-singaporean-bloggers-asylum-request

Obama’s hatred extends to all non-blacks. We saw shocking examples when he attacked the victim of a black thug, Puerto Rican, George Zimmerman. While defending murderous hate groups like BLM.
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March 30, 2017 12:33pm
- Tirebiter
  
  “We saw shocking examples when he attacked the victim of a black thug, Puerto Rican, George Zimmerman.”
  Not quite. Zimmerman was a known vigilante who often roamed his housing project with a pistol looking for trouble. He confronted an unarmed black teenager told him to leave, which he had no authority to do, then in a scuffle shot him dead. If you’re going to comment on the US at least get some of your facts right.
  
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  March 31, 2017 3:45am
Fletch

Stefan Molyneux in a new video begging for donations to keep going after YouTube started de-monetizing its videos on the pretense that advertisers are pulling out because their ads are being placed with objectionable content. Guess whose videos are being restricted the most? That’s right – conservative ones.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ8NvWvMF-I
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March 30, 2017 1:25pm
- cha
  
  Guess whose videos are being restricted the most? That’s right – conservative ones.
  
  I guess conservative snoflakes could build their own safe ~~space~~ site.
  
  2 13
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  March 30, 2017 1:36pm
  - Fletch
    
    Not really. YouTube is the platform. You may as well say that a group should build their own phone network.
    
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    March 30, 2017 1:41pm
  - itstricky
    
    It is with no irony and a pretty straight face that one notes that the RWNJs are exactly the same as the LWNJs and hold pretty much the same arguments and thinking.
    
    2 5
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    March 30, 2017 5:05pm
  - Kea
    
    cha, I think you should get your own oxygen and stop stealing it from decent people.
    
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    March 30, 2017 5:36pm
Stars And Stripes

Rapist wins case to be allowed to stay in NZ
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/327784/rapist-wins-case-to-be-allowed-to-stay-in-nz.
“A man who raped a sleeping woman at a party has won his appeal against deportation to India.
Mr Singh had also been convicted of drink driving, passport fraud, dangerous driving and failing to stop after an accident”.

No wonder we have some rubbish people in this country when the retards at the Immigration and Protection Tribunal can’t even find the stomach to remove trash like this because it might be a bit tough on his family.
Good grief.
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March 30, 2017 1:26pm
- SPC
  
  Rapist are and have been deported.
  
  The Immigration and Protection Tribunal suspended his deportation liability for five years, meaning he will not be deported if he does not commit an imprisonable offence in that time.
  
  The tribunal heard his 3-year-old son was unable to go to pre-school because his wife has become too unwell to take him. The issue is there is a child with a depressed mother (no surprise), whether she will improve/the family works on his release is an unknown …
  
  4 2
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  March 30, 2017 4:34pm
  - Stars And Stripes
    
    Sorry SPC but rapists from India being allowed to stay by these clowns seems to be common.
    http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/83043792/Man-who-raped-teen-girl-will-not-be-deported.
    
    Spin a sob story about your family being affected and every time a coconut.
    Plenty of decent immigrants wanting to come here without keeping all these scum here who obviously don’t appreciate the chance they were given.
    
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    March 30, 2017 4:50pm
- Captain Mainwaring
  
  I wonder if Deborah Manning is his lawyer.
  
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  March 30, 2017 4:40pm
Stars And Stripes

Record numbers of children in the care of CYF
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/90964435/record-numbers-of-children-in-the-care-of-cyf-as-govt-prepares-for-new-era-in-state-care
“A record number of children have been taken into state care in the last year – a sign of serious underfunding as Child, Youth and Family (CYF) transitions into the new Ministry for Vulnerable Children, say the Greens”.

Ah yes it’s all the governments fault that more kids than ever are in state care as the funding is not enough.
Nothing to do with more neglectful hopeless parents of course.
I thought the Greens anti smacking bill was supposed to have sorted all this out years ago?.
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March 30, 2017 2:07pm
- Kimbo
  
  Um, isn’t it a reflection of the scrapping the requirement that children must be placed with family/whanau, and instead Anne Tolley’s new policy that the child’s safety is now the primary requirement?
  
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  March 30, 2017 2:17pm
  - Stars And Stripes
    
    No you are just being racist now?.
    
    11 0
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    March 30, 2017 2:20pm
    - Kimbo
      
      Sorry, am stealing your “even a bigot like me knows that” line 🙂
      
      Is still in my top 5 KB comebacks of all time, btw. Pity you wasted it on stephieboy,
      
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      March 30, 2017 2:25pm
- SPC
  
  Er the point was to quantify violence, and John Key supported this – thus government was supposed to have funded the services managing child safety.
  
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  March 30, 2017 4:15pm
Chuck Bird

Who is the best actor?

Troy Taylor

Mark Lundy

David Bain
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March 30, 2017 6:05pm
- Kea
  
  Butcher Bain
  
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  March 30, 2017 6:14pm
- Longknives
  
  Bain was an even worse Actor than Lundy- Remember the Ambulance Officers were adamant he was faking!
  *Ambulance Officers deal with a lot of ‘Hollywood’ and ‘Drama Queens’- They know bullshit when they see it.
  
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  March 30, 2017 7:20pm
  - Kea
    
    Give him a break. He was a bit off his game and tired after killing his entire family. He probably had trouble remembering his lines.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:06pm
  - Inandout
    
    Yep, ambos can sense murderers.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:19pm
Kea

Zionist nut jobs try and justify the establishment of modern Israel by repeating the lie Jews have always lived there. The fact is they came from Egypt and took the land by war from the people living there and divided it among their tribal cult. This is what the Jews themselves teach.

Where is the “right of return” for the descendants of the Canaanites ?

From there they begin the systematic conquest of Canaan. the end of Chapter 12, each native nation has fallen. The conquest is complete and allocation of land can begin.

Allocation of Land
From Chapters 13 to 22, the Book of Joshua provides a detailed account of how the land will be divided up among the tribes.

http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/the-book-of-joshua/
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March 30, 2017 6:09pm
- SPC
  
  If you are going to believe the bible story – then note the bible says all Canaanites in the land before them were exterminated.
  
  This is how they claim to be the original people, by killing of those there earlier.
  
  A bit like how Europeans settled USA, but generously left a few locals in reservations. Which appears to be the model Zionists are adopting this time, a few urban areas outside the fenced off settlement areas left to be self-governing once the PA is crushed under foot.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:18pm
  - Kimbo
    
    If you are going to believe the bible story…
    
    Reluctant tointerrupt you spirited exchange with Kea, but which biblical story? Like the Creation and Flood narratives in Genesis chapter 1 to 11, there are two accounts of the Conquest. with different emphases. After the death of Joshua, the next book in the Hebrew canon commences with the following:
    
    After the death of Joshua, the Israelites asked the Lord, “Who of us is to go up first to fight against the Canaanites?” (Judges 1: 1)
    
    …so the Canaanites were not obliterated. Nor, as per the rest of the book of Judges, did that occur…
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:31pm
    - SPC
      
      Depends you define those “Canaanites” they fought against in the post Joshua period, only the Philistines resided within Canaan itself.
      
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      March 30, 2017 8:43pm
      - SPC
        
        And they were pretty late on the scene.
        
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        March 30, 2017 8:49pm
      - Kimbo
        
        How about we stick to the Biblical definition? The book of Judges, like Joshua before it, is part of the same Deuteronomic-history narrative, and it details at later points in the books distinct groups such as Midianites, Philistines and Amalekites, etc. Thematically they are the same – enemies of the Israelites, yet instruments of Yahweh to discipline his people when they (Israel) are unfaithful…yet also distinct and historic people groups incorporated into a thematic and theological history. Which is how all of the “holy history” of Israel should be treated, not as exact events recorded on a 2nd Century BC version of an iphone camera.
        
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        March 30, 2017 8:59pm
      - SPC
        
        Only the recently arrived Philistines lived within Canaan/Palestine. The Amalekites in Sinai, the Idumeans were closer to Canaan than the Midianites – both opposite the Sinai across the Aqaba. More a threat to control of trade routes from Elath to Gaza than groups present in Canaan. Neither posed as based in areas of tribal inheritance, no more than the Moabites and Ammonites east of the Jordan.
        
        Each (barring the Philistines) was posed more of a threat to any authority in Canaan than rivals within Canaan. Identifying external groups as Canaanites was a way deny such an identity to those living within tribal areas.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:12pm
      - SPC
        
        Which indicates I tend to look at the identity politics game (propaganda) being played out, for nationalist purpose, given I have no interest in apologising for the theological narrative.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:18pm
      - Kimbo
        
        Neither posed as based in areas of tribal inheritance, no more than the Moabites and Ammonites east of the Jordan.
        
        No, not so. Have you forgotten that according to the allotment of land in the book of Joshua, there were tribal Israelite dwellings est of the Jordan River?
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:19pm
      - SPC
        
        And those territories east of the Jordan were not regarded as being within Canaan.
        
        And they posed a threat to those tribes, Rueben Gad (and more to the north) in their territories from areas – nearby but apart from them.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:25pm
    - Kimbo
      
      Which indicates I tend to look at the identity politics game (propaganda) being played out, for nationalist purpose, given I have no interest in apologising for the theological narrative.
      
      Sorry, I know what the various elements of that statement mean, but I don’t know what you are trying to say when you join them together. Can you please have another go?
      
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      March 30, 2017 9:22pm
      - SPC
        
        Why, I had to put with “holy history”?
        
        Nothing historical about false prophet writings.
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:28pm
      - Kimbo
        
        Nothing historical about false prophet writings.
        
        Ok, I think that is our point of disagreement. “Nothing” is an over-statement (the Amalekites existed, so did the Moabites, the Edomites, the Ammonites, the Philistines…
        
        However, like the New Testament, the Old Testament is not “history in the modern sense (like “science” that was only “invented” a few hundred years ago(, but kerygma/proclamation using historical events as the foundation. Maybe that is the same as your “propaganda”. Depends if you believe it…
        
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        March 30, 2017 9:37pm
      - SPC
        
        It’s a matter of perspective, secular (ethnic people) nation or religious nation. A distinction that continues to this day.
        
        In identifying the neighbouring peoples as Canaanites, they denied any such identiy to those within the tribal territories. Identifying all of Canaan (and parts beyond the Jordan), as Israeli inheritance.
        
        The more religious perspective, also catered to, was the noion that their victory over Canaan was dependent on their God and only as the people of their God would their victory endure – which sort of guaranteed the offerings to the Levites (who had skin in this game).
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:15pm
- Kea
  
  I do not believe the bible stories. Relgious Jews do. You do and use that bullshit to justify the establishment of modern Israel and their crimes.
  
  Personally I want all you religious nut jobs to stop the bloody wars. That is all. I actually wish no harm on the Jews or anybody else.
  
  If you want to believe in fairy tales then so be it. No worries.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:44pm
  - SPC
    
    Stop making things up.
    
    1 3
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    March 30, 2017 8:48pm
    - Kea
      
      Write to the Jewish learning site and suggest they amend their sacred texts dipshit.
      
      Or are you just a slithering coward shooting the messenger ?
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:04pm
      - SPC
        
        Messenger of what?
        
        Your standard tactic is to launch personal attacks on those who do not bow down and worship your latest slight of a certain group of people. And the nature of those attacks is, as usual, the same – infer guilt by association with that group of people.
        
        You claim to know what I believe, an outright lie, you have no more honesty and decency than Baldrick’s turnip.
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:27pm
  - Tirebiter
    
    The bible is an interesting work of literature and religious philosophy, not a primer on science, geography, or history. That fact that anybody accepts it as anything else shows how gullible and uncritical people are.
    
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    March 31, 2017 3:52am
Nostradamus

Yesterday Calendar Girl said:

Griff’s on enforced leave at present, with another six weeks to go. What new expression(s) of insult and abuse might he come back with after this period of self-induced isolation?

Griff popped up at Pete George’s blog:

After being exposed to the stupidity of political blogs and the thoughts of people on them I have come to the conclusion that the human race is mad .

Homo “sapiens” is a myth. Most humans are ill equipped to examining the world around them objectively and as a result live in a false reality pushed on them from external forces.

Gaia will win in the end.

Would anyone like to volunteer to be Griff’s support person in his time of need?
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March 30, 2017 6:31pm
- Kea
  
  Oh hell yes ❗ 🙂
  
  Griff and I have always had a very special bond. I feel a duty of care towards Griff and have always been there for him during his decent into madness.
  
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  March 30, 2017 6:39pm
- krazykiwi
  
  Me me me… pick me 😀
  
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  March 30, 2017 6:42pm
- nasska
  
  Cruel bastards! If you ignore his fixation with the weather he’s okay. 🙂
  
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  March 30, 2017 6:45pm
  - Kea
    
    nasska, you may not remember, but at first Griff liked me. We fought as one against the Theists and Homo-haters. One day I questioned the reliability of his weather forecasts and he took it rather personally.
    
    Notice he referenced “Gaia” I always had him on about that and he denied it was his belief amid torrents of abuse. He claimed his beliefs were based on cold hard science. Let the record note he has finally come clean and his cover is blown.
    
    We should throw him a really big party when he returns. Though I might not make it as the Zionists are getting rabid again 🙂
    
    5 1
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    March 30, 2017 6:59pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Oh, the entire human race is mad.
  What a cheek!
  
  I thought that adjective was especially reserved for me and fellow “deniers”
  Seems we are just the same as all you other folks.
  
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  March 30, 2017 6:52pm
  - Nostradamus
    
    Maggy:
    
    What do you think Griff meant when he said “Gaia will win in the end”? Will Gaia unleash earthquakes and extreme weather events on us as punishment for our sins (as Griff says) or is that simply to punish the gays (as Brian Tamaki says)?
    
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    March 30, 2017 6:59pm
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      @Nostradamus
      
      I am upset.
      Why haven’t you organised some counselling for me?
      I thought I was part of the 3% special folk, but I’m just the same as the 97% true climate believers.
      What a bluddy swindle.
      
      I’m not getting into all this Gaia tosh….
      Listen to this chappy… and tell me if you want to become a symbiotic Gaian?
      http://www.theoryculturesociety.org/video-bruno-clarkes-rethinking-gaia-stengers-latour-margulis/
      Crikey dick.. if this is our future on KB, I’m gonna be a sheeple.
      
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      March 30, 2017 7:39pm
- Kea
  
  I just read Griff’s rant on PG’s blog. The first part was really good and I agree with it, but the second part reads like a drug trip complete with cartoons.
  
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  March 30, 2017 7:39pm
  - starboard
    
    Poor old gwiff, wonder how his northland utopia is going. Reminds me of that pedo and his crowd on the west coast..hopeful christian and glorivale..lol dirty old sifter gwiff.
    
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    March 30, 2017 10:33pm
    - Kea
      
      He has retreated to his secure compound to await the end times. Gaia is mad at the 0.000000023 degree warming [predicted by computer games]
      
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      March 30, 2017 10:38pm
      - starboard
        
        Lol waco northland
        
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        March 30, 2017 10:56pm
Captain Mainwaring

Oh shit, the tin’s run dry.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/91039043/labour-amps-up-pressure-on-donors-warning-campaign-may-be-scaled-back

Bwahahahahah………hahahahah

Couldn’t happen to a better bunch of morons.
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March 30, 2017 7:48pm
- stigie
  
  “On Tuesday, in an emailed plea to supporters for funds, campaign manager Andrew Kirton said the party had until Friday to raise another $9179 to reach its March target”.
  
  Can’t help thinking this is going towards Angry’s defamation case !~
  
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  March 30, 2017 7:58pm
  - nasska
    
    They’ll have to get Greg Presland to run Little’s defence stigie.
    
    He’d lose badly but at least he wouldn’t charge much. 🙂
    
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    March 30, 2017 8:24pm
  - Happychappy
    
    You have to laugh in one breath they are saying these poor people haven’t got money for food, rent or heating and in the next breath they are willing to take their money so Little can achieve his dream to be Prime Minister.
    
    6 0
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    March 30, 2017 9:30pm
- SPC
  
  No chance of them giving their snouts a rest and putting 10% of the MP pay into the kitty? Or would this get in the way of mortgage payments on their property portfolio? At least Greens have skin the game – why donate to Labour, when they take take take.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:29pm
stigie

Haha i reckon if ole Mickey Savage ran Angry’s defence Nasska, it would have to be a considerable financial benefit to the Hagaman’s..?
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March 30, 2017 8:35pm
nasska

A Muslim’s biggest fear:

When your son’s name is Allah Akbar and you lose him at the airport.
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March 30, 2017 8:45pm
- SPC
  
  Just realised how Bart could prank an airport/hotel PA system.
  
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  March 30, 2017 8:52pm
  - SPC
    
    Allan K Barr comes to mind.
    
    3 1
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    March 30, 2017 9:21pm
- Inandout
  
  Cat Stevens is a coming, except he is now Yusuf Islam. I wonder if he is going to sing ‘I’m Gonna Get Me a Gun’ at Auckland Airport?
  
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  March 30, 2017 10:28pm
Jack5

Milk – white gold – they called it at the recent height of NZ’s dairy boom. But milk isn’t always gold in China, which Fonterra and NZ see as the world’s El Dorado dairy market.

The share price of China’s biggest dairy farmer has collapsed spectacularly, with the treasurer suddenly going into hiding.

China Huishan Dairy Holdings shares fell 85 per cent in an hour on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange last Friday.

Ge Kun, the wife of the chairman and controlling shareholder, Yang Kai, is is also the firm’s treasury chief. She is the executive director in charge of relationships with the company’s principal bankers. The company says Ge Kun has been “out of contact” since Tuesday of last week. The firm says this is the day on which Yang Kai learned the company’s payments to banks were late.

The China Huishan Dairy Holdings share price had been under pressure for a month or more from an American short seller, the hedge fund, Muddy Waters.

China Huishan Dairy Holdings has dismissed reports that it had issued fake invoices, and that chairman Yang Kai had misappropriated funds to invest in real estate in Shenyang, capital of Liaoning, the province in which the company runs dairy farms.

Yang Kai is rumoured to have used his China Huishan shares as collateral to borrow money he used in an attempt to stem the fall in the share price by buying more shares.

Bloomberg reports Huishan products range from cow feed to raw milk to high-end dairy products — and that its market capitalisation was nearly $US 5 billion two weeks ago.

The Dutch firm, FrieslandCampina, the world’s sixth biggest dairy company, has taken a bath from the dive in the share price of China Huishan Dairy Holdings. The two companies set up a joint venture to process China Huishan’s milk into infant food for Asian markets, and FrieslandCampina bought a stake in China Huishan. The Financial Times says the China Huishan share price collapse has cost FrieslandCampina about $NZ70 million.
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March 30, 2017 9:13pm
- Jack5
  
  Can I take it from the downtick that Ge Kun is hiding in New Zealand and following Kiwiblog?
  
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  March 30, 2017 9:22pm
Jack5

Am I correct in thinking you still have to access Kiwiblog through https// to get the edit function working, but the uptick/downtick voting works through plain-vanilla http ????
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March 30, 2017 9:21pm
Jack5

Kea, you’re still here. Well done.

Have you been into anger management?
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March 30, 2017 9:28pm
Jack5

It’s quiet on Kiwiblog tonight. Will someone please take the rug cover off Kea’s cage.
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March 30, 2017 9:33pm
Jack5

I’m talking to myself here, so goodnight folks. Or as one of our regular bloggers here might say, Gute nacht Herrenvolk.
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March 30, 2017 9:35pm
starboard

Hey hey trendsetters..
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March 30, 2017 10:23pm
starboard

…anyhoo life is fine and dandy here on Phuket..stinking hot must of tapped 33 today. Im off out shortly for happy hour down at the Freedom Bar Rawai then a seafood meal on the waterfront and to finish, an oil massage. Lifes fab right now for the starboard. Cant complain one bit.
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March 30, 2017 10:28pm
sooty

Friday morning and even Barry Soper is casting doubt on the half sucked throaties version of the events with the SAS. But at the sametime possum head wants an inquiry. Boy hes on a hiding to nothing come election day.
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March 31, 2017 7:25am

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Health Target 5 – elective treatments
Health Target 4 – Specialist appointments
Health Target 3 – Emergency Dept Waiting Times
Health Target 2 – Immunisations

Links

Barry Soper: The h?koi was M?ori Party's crowning glory
Breaking Views
The h?koi was M?ori Party’s crowning glory – and provided plenty for Labour to think
Point of Order
Wishes?
No Minister
It’s National ACT NZF who are Dishonouring the Treaty + the day Moana Jackson knocked Gerry Brownlee on his bum
The Daily Blog
Not how much but how well
Hompaddock
Open mike 22/11/2024
The Standard
Defying cries of “transphobia”, the Washington Post calls for debate on whether trans women should participate in women’s sports
Utopia
Drawn
No Right Turn
Regulatory Reform: Timid and too easily tamed?
Not PC
The transgender agenda sunk Kamala
Bob McCoskrie's McBlog
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT
No Punches Pulled (Bob Jones)
What does “reciprocity” mean in New Zealand laws?
Croaking Cassandra
A Day of Reckoning
NZCPR
Media Link: “A View from Afar” on the US elections.
Kiwipolitico
This will not end well
Offsetting Behaviour
Top 14 Predictions for Round 10
Stats Chat
Tory Whanau may have to sell Wellington mayoralty to make ends meet
The Civilian
The Accidental Engagement
Imperator Fish
Legal Beagle: Election '23: The Special Votes
Public Address
Making this movie might have been a mistake
Liam Hehir
Why I am retiring from political blogging
Kiwi FireWalker
Angie Warren-Clark: Meet the Newbies
Dan Moskovitz