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February 5, 2022 8:00am by Kokila Patel

General Debate 05 February 2022

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General Debate

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Tony Stuart

An outstanding piece from Steven Joyce this morning, which begins thus:

If travel broadens the mind, then perhaps the reverse might also be true.

We have become a more insular country since Covid started, and it is very unattractive. The social media vitriol and judgment directed at journalist Charlotte Bellis for daring to speak out about her predicament last week reflects badly on all who indulged.

Let’s be clear here. It was Ms Bellis who was let down by her own country. Forget all the whataboutisms. When she needed to come home, when she needed a safe haven where she could be pregnant and give birth to her child, her country said no. That was simply appalling. It has never been who we are.

It was not just appalling for Ms Bellis. She was simply the human straw that broke the camel’s back. In being rebuffed by the bureaucratic monster that is our managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) system, she joins thousands and thousands before her over the past two years who have had their spirits broken in their time of need.

People with dying relatives, those who are dying themselves, pregnant women needing to come home to be with family, those who have lost jobs or outstayed their welcome offshore. There are too many stories to count where a heartless decision-maker showed no empathy, no ability to walk a mile in the shoes of desperate Kiwis overseas, no willingness to make things right.

Somehow, the Government’s sudden ability to find an MIQ slot for Ms Bellis under the public spotlight of the world’s media made an appalling situation even shoddier. It was a brazen attempt at damage control by ministers, presumably breaking the rules their own officials had been zealously upholding. There was no apology for those who had come before, no acceptance that the policy had been wrong, just cold, naked politics at its worst.

You can’t blame the people who tell their story to the media. These are the ones brave enough to run the judgmental gauntlet of their fellow New Zealanders to try shaming the Government into acting. Many people have suddenly been found a slot when their story makes it into the public domain, although for some it has come too late.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/steven-joyce-closing-the-doors-is-that-really-who-we-are/WL5BOGYB5BKOA4T2VTBDMJ66GY/

Some of the attacks on Charlotte Bellis this week on social media were disgraceful. A number were from high profile New Zealanders, and holders of honours conferred by the Queen. A former MP described the decision to give Ms Bellis a quarantine space as “white power”. Another former MP questioned the validity of Bellis’ claim for an MIQ spot and several people on social media suggested she have an abortion.

Despite the PM’s announcement this week of a progressive opening of the border from 27 February, the Grounded Kiwis High Court case against the Government will still proceed on 14 February. That’s good, because the Government’s determination to keep New Zealanders out of their own country must be legally challenged.
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December 5, 2021 8:47am
- Brian McDonald
  
  Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
  I read Ms Bellis saying she turned down the opportunity to stay in a safe country in Europe because she couldn’t stay there “very long.”
  I also read criticism of her being used by the Taliban for publicity purposes as they carry on committing crimes against Afghan women and children. You seem silent on that Tony?
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:59am
  - Loddenthinks
    
    And the complete f*kwits with their “whataboutism” in 3, 2, 1…..
    
    Oh wait, McDonald’s always been an over-achiever in that regard.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:03am
  - Tony Stuart
    
    Good on you for so quickly illustrating Steven Joyce’s point about the “judgmental gauntlet of their fellow New Zealanders” Brian.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:04am
  - SmokerGuy
    
    Ffs do you honestly think she mentioned the taliban as some sort of way to praise them????? She was highlighting the absurdity of the situation her own government put her in. She was highlighting how one of the most repressive regimes in the world actually acted with more compassion to her than the people who supposedly (and I really emphasis this because this government does anything but in every area) are meant to take care of their citizens. They have bought so much shame on New Zealand.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:14am
  - amospicton
    
    Brian she’s a New Zealander – she should be able to come home! End of story.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:18am
    - Paulus
      
      Am I right but is this country will be only shortly open to New Zealand “Citizens” and not for example “Permanent Residents”?
      Usual confusion from this lot.
      
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      February 5, 2022 1:06pm
  - Lee C
    
    Lovely to see such pragmatic abuse of the moral high ground Brian.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:25am
  - Alan Wilkinson
    
    Laughable tripe. It’s a sad day when NZ has a Government so incompetently stupid and uncaring that it can make the Taliban look good and then complain about the comparison. It has supporters to match.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:56am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Cheers for the confirmation that Ardern acolytes are increasingly irrational and delusional and afraid. Their princess is exposed and it is ugly.
    The confirmation wasn’t really needed, but thanks for making the effort.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:25am
  - emmess
    
    Oh, what does she think she is an illegal economic migrant to be able to choose whatever country she wants to live in?
    The nerve of it
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:32am
  - RoboRob
    
    Talk about totally missing the point Brian. Well done
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:36am
  - Rich Prick
    
    That’s such a low shot at a woman who has done nothing more than share her predicament at the hands of our “kind” government.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:47am
  - Fishing in the dark
    
    just hide in your cave.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:27pm
  - The Feed
    
    We saw the true face.
    
    They may hide behind masks of “kindness”. They may believe themselves to be morally superior. They say they care.
    
    They do not.
    
    Their actions and their words showed who they really are.
    
    They denied one of their own citizens the right to come home and have her baby here. They abused a pregnant woman. Because she embarrassed them.
    
    That is who they really are.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:56pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Yes indeed, Play the ball and not the Man immediately comes to mind.
  
  What I find personally disturbing is the way the Grounded Kiwis Court case was deferred.
  
  As a Mariner personally caught up in this quagmire and not allowed to return home , I have nothing but absolute contempt for authorities to blatently disregard International Rules and conventions.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:59am
  - Taieri
    
    As a Mariner personally caught up in this quagmire and not allowed to return home , I have nothing but absolute contempt for authorities to blatently disregard International Rules and conventions.
    —————–
    
    I’ll second you on that.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:02pm
    - Master Mariner
      
      Cheers Mate, Hope alls well your end too.
      
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      February 5, 2022 2:34pm
  - sealegs
    
    As to breaking international rules and conventions, it has consequences as the Sanfords NZ longliner has lost its permit to fish the South Georgia fishery this year after 20 years of permits. The NZ governments refusal of letting in 2 British ships crews last year has definitely had consequences. Add to that the 3 kiwi crew imprisoned for the pub brawl in Port Stanley and now it will cost several millions in lost earnings.
    
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    February 5, 2022 4:19pm
- nathie
  
  Please National and Luxon, either bring Steven Joyce back into National on the next List …. or have him appointed to consult or advise etc when National/ACT form the next government!
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:11am
  - Tony Stuart
    
    I doubt Joyce would want to return to Parliament, but I am sure he will be involved behind the scenes in some capacity.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:23am
    - Tricati
      
      Bloody hope so.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:38am
    - yobi
      
      One can only hope.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:03am
  - curry4me
    
    nathie: The consulting idea would work.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:33am
- Sir Cullen's Sidekick
  
  Tony – Local sheeple supported gummit on keeping fellow NZers out of the country at any cost. Don’t you ever forget that.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:00am
  - mawm
    
    Local sheeple did their best to keep Aucklanders out of their communities, the same Aucklanders who pay exorbitant rates on their baches which keep these small communities afloat.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:08am
  - Master Mariner
    
    Yes Indeed, But would they support it if found Illegal?
    That’s the question and answer we will find very shortly.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:32am
    - Sir Cullen's Sidekick
      
      Master Mariner – Gummit will win that case easily. Watch out.
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:46am
      - Master Mariner
        
        Nope, Not at least with International conventions regarding Seafarers and Rights of repatriation to Home Country.
        NZ is out on a limb.
        Just wait and see.
        
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        February 5, 2022 2:36pm
  - Rich Prick
    
    I am amused by the “open borders!” crowd from just over two years ago being so adamant borders must remain firmly closed now. Come on guys, which is it?
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:36pm
    - Albert_Ross
      
      Who is this “crowd”? Who exactly are you talking about and to? Who said two years ago that borders must open and are now saying that borders must remain closed?
      
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      February 5, 2022 2:33pm
  - Tony Stuart
    
    Only until Charlotte posted photos of her baby bump. Now it’s just the most fervent Jacinda-ites that are sticking up for her. Don’t you ever forget THAT!
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:04pm
- alloytoo
  
  Foreign DJs can apparently get MIQ slots on demand. Pregnant New Zealanders have to shame the government.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:18am
iMP

MANUKA. A Nz trust has lost an attempt to register an international trademark “Manuka honey” like French Champagne or Bordeaux or Belgian chocolate.

Is it the international plant with a Maori name (Manuka) or the colonising patriarchy of English bees and the honey-making process, being registering?

Y’see, to me, that is a beautiful symbol of the fusion that is integrated modern NZ. The breaking of us all into fractured parts based on race, with divergent rights, makes bad honey.

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/country/460818/trust-to-appeal-manuka-honey-trademark-rejection
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February 5, 2022 8:04am
- iMP
  
  For the record: Leptospermum scoparium, commonly called mānuka, manuka, manuka myrtle, New Zealand teatree, broom tea-tree, or just tea tree, is a species of flowering plant in the myrtle family Myrtaceae, native to south-east Australia and New Zealand.
  
  So how long before tiresome separatists try and claim “Manuka honey” as an indigenous taonga when it is a colonial import using an Aust/NZ plant grown all over the world simply because here, we have given it a Maori name alongside its Latin descriptive?
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:15am
  - pdm
    
    IMP – just think of the benefits though if this diverted Nanaia Mahuta away from 3Waters.
    
    Win win for New Zealanders.
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:20am
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Yes exactly. They are a bit bloody late. “Manuka honey” has been around in Australia for 100 years.
    
    https://biosota.com.au/blogs/resources/how-manuka-honey-is-made
    
    This appeal has zero chance of succeeding.
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:21am
  - mikenmildagain
    
    It’s about whether the product, from Australia or NZ, should be labelled ‘Manuka’. Australian honey producers are using the NZ name for the plant to cash in on a brand that has been built by NZ producers.
    Is anyone making claims about honey being indigenous to NZ?
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:21am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      You have no evidence. If you were correct they would have won the case. The Australian honey guys could say…
      
      “New Zealand honey producers are using the Australian name for the plant to cash in on a brand that has been built by Australian producers.”
      
      Manuka has been around in Australia for 100 years. A suburb in Canberra is called “Manuka”, established in 1926.
      
      Give it up.
      
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      February 5, 2022 8:48am
      - mikenmildagain
        
        I understand the NZ producers are considering what to do next to produce their brand. Not everything in the world is as simplistic as you like to imagine.
        
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        February 5, 2022 8:58am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        It is not “their brand”. Do you own shares in a New Zealand outfit?
        
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        February 5, 2022 10:40am
  - CJames
    
    Manuka honey didn’t exist before European settlement as it was the Europeans that brought the honey bee. The native bees were solitary insects so no hives. But I suppose that is just a nitpicking trivial fact that will disappear down the memory hole.
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:28am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    Here’s the latest paper on the genetics of manuka..
    (published 22 Jan 2022)
    
    Genome-wide patterns of genetic diversity, population structure and demographic history in mānuka (Leptospermum scoparium) growing on indigenous Māori land
    
    https://academic.oup.com/hr/article/doi/10.1093/hr/uhab012/6510203
    
    Basically, Manuka has been in NZ for about 15 million years
    There’s been repeated gene flow from Australia to NZ.
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:59am
    - rangitoto
      
      Does the pollen cross the Tasman or birds transfer seeds or both?
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:47am
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        That is not explained in the paper, but either pollen or seed could be the source.
        
        Manuka seeds are extremely light and could be easily transported across the Tasman in air currents (especially during a big fire season in SE Australia).
        
        Many flying insects visit manuka flowers…and could bring pollen on their bodies if they were caught up in winds .
        
        Manuka pollen is easily shaken loose from ripe anthers and could also be blown to NZ.
        
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        February 5, 2022 2:41pm
    - Fishing in the dark
      
      There are no indigenous human being, arrived about 1200 and today none is 100% early settlers at its best 50%.
      Aboriginals are true indigenous habitants of Australia.
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:35pm
- Benedict Yu
  
  The Champagne comparison is stupid. Champagne is made in Champagne and has been for 500 years. Good luck with marketing New Zealand “Champagne” ???
  
  Manuka honey is made by bees and a flowering plant found in Australia and New Zealand called “Manuka”.
  
  Just shut up about it and make the honey.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:25am
  - yossarian
    
    But making honey is hard work, much easier to do no work and claim someone else’s hard work because I have special blood in my veins.
    
    The generation of Gimme, Gimme, Gimme knows no bounds.
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:30am
  - mikenmildagain
    
    It is, actually, the same argument. Champagne can be made anywhere in the world with the same type of grapes that also grow in France. It is quite possible to find bottles of methode traditionelle made in many countries that are indistinguishable from French champagne. The only difference is that the French wine industry has successfully erected an artificial trade barrier; while the NZ honey industry has not.
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:50am
    - Maggie's partner
      
      Total drivel. Sparkling wine can be made anywhere in the world, yes, and it is primarily the method, not the rapes which defines it, but Champagne is so called because of the region it is made in, and therefore whilst ignorant people might refer to it as English or Russian Champagne, it is not.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:07am
      - septic skeptic
        
        Sure. But the protection goes beyond just the name “champagne”. For years overseas producers made “methode champegnoise” – yet somehow the French succeeded in getting that descriptor banned as well.
        
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        February 5, 2022 11:01am
    - cmm
      
      There is a difference with Champagne. Champagne is an actual place. It cannot be moved.
      
      Manuka can grow anywhere.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:24am
    - Jack5
      
      A Canadian “bee ecologist’s” take on what he calls manuka honey’s “gimmick” over other honey, methylglyoxal:
      
      https://badbeekeepingblog.com/2016/02/27/manuka-recall/
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:38am
    - Benedict Yu
      
      You have just demonstrated that you know less about champagne than honey. ? Keep going.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:42am
      - mikenmildagain
        
        I feel a bit sorry for you, Benedict. You are obviously an intelligent person but, like many smart people, once you have leapt to a conclusion you find it difficult to change your mind.
        The argument about manuka honey is exactly like that about champagne – an attempt by some producers to restrict the ability of other producers to use the same name for an objectively identical product.
        There are many different champagnes made in Champagne – lots of them are qualitatively inferior to wines made in other regions from the same grapes with the same method. It is simply the peculiarities of abstract legal and trading arrangements that allow one group of producers to claim exclusivity for their product name while denying similar exclusivity to others.
        The NZ producers are just trying the same technique – perhaps they will succeed eventually, but I doubt it, as they lack the power of French wine producers and the French government.
        
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        February 5, 2022 11:26am
      - Benedict Yu
        
        “You are obviously an intelligent person but, like many smart people, once you have leapt to a conclusion you find it difficult to change your mind.”
        
        Oh no you are still digging. ?
        
        Seriously? I don’t change my mind? 5 months ago I was an advocate for child Covid vaccines. I changed my mind.
        
        If the Manuka honey folk win their case with new evidence, good luck to them.
        
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        February 5, 2022 12:20pm
      - mikenmildagain
        
        Now you are back on track, Benedict. Well done!
        
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        February 5, 2022 12:32pm
  - JibberJabber
    
    Let’s just be thankful its place of origin is not Tutaekuri. ?
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:01am
    - oldfella
      
      jj: or Billy T’s ‘Pakitiwhinau’.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:42am
  - Sir Cullen's Sidekick
    
    Will there be a “honey levy” to protect the bees? Asking for a Green friend.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:02am
  - I remember when
    
    Capilano Honey: Australian Manuka Chronology:
    1882 Tasmanian government House of Assembly report describes Manuka trees, first recorded evidence of the words being used to describe heptospermum plants.
    
    1870 The Maori and English Dictionary by Rev Richard Taylor recorded its use for the tea tree.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:06am
  - I remember when
    
    Capilano Honey: Australian Manuka Honey:
    1882 Tasmanian government House of Assembly report describes Manuka trees, first recorded evidence of the word being used to describe Leptospermum plants.
    As I can no use of the word Kanuka in Australian it was not the word used to describe the plant before the Maori word was adopted.
    Obviously, before that date another name was used to name the plant.
    An aboringinal word would be the obvious suggestion.
    Why don’t we ask them.
    Oops – none of them left in Tasmania.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:17am
- Nickc2
  
  What if the Brits trademarked the Jersey cow and demanded NZ Farmers pay a royalty for every pound of product produced. How would that work?
  Courtest Google:
  Jersey is the most profitable cow for today’s dairy business. She produces a pound of milk components at a lower cost compared to the other major breeds. She has little or no calving problems, greater fertility, a shorter calving interval, and earlier maturity.
  I think someone is trying to bee (pun intended) too smart/gready when it comes to Manuka Honet/Money.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:36am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Local club decided to poison numerous plants because they are “not native”. I asked about the lemon trees but apparently they’re ok because they use them in the GnTs. Moral high ground won.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:30am
Tricati

Maybe the worm is turning when media are asking questions as to the transparency of the government and the public service. A number of these types of articles recently will have the PM’s spin doctors worried, and no doubt, the Monday morning instructions from the PM’s Press Secretary to the MSM editors will be getting a bit terse.
Even more surprising this opinion piece was on Stuff.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/127682814/when-did-our-public-service-get-so-arrogant
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February 5, 2022 8:05am
- Tony Stuart
  
  All summed up in these paragraphs:
  
  And it is partly because of the very tight media ship captained by Jacinda Ardern. The prime minister has won plaudits the world over for her empathetic and straightforward communication style.
  
  But it’s an artfully crafted mirage, as my colleague Andrea Vance wrote last year. “At every level, the Government manipulates the flow of information,” she wrote.
  
  When I was writing about New Zealand’s response to the pandemic for The Washington Post, almost every minister or ministry I contacted for an interview responded with a variation on: I’ll need to check with the prime minister’s office.
  
  It’s refreshing to have a senior member of the media – Anna Fifield is editor of Stuff’s Wellington newsroom and the Dominion Post – speaking so frankly.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:29am
  - Frank the tank
    
    They are sensing the change and smelling the air. Luxon and Seymour will have the treasury benches in 2023 and Stuffed if it wants to survive will have to change its reporting bias
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:36am
    - EssenX
      
      100%
      
      They’re now worried and are trying to get Labour to improve its performance before it’s too late and they lose their subsidies. The thing is though that if they had been critical of Labour from the start, when Labour erred, then maybe Labour wouldn’t be so bad. But they didn’t. Labour got arrogant FAST and didn’t work to improve the skills and competencies of its Ministers. There is major change in public sentiment and the pendulum is going to swing back to the right in a big, and some may say bad, way in the next few years.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:33am
  - Loddenthinks
    
    That’s true Tony, but the fact they’re only now starting to turn on the government after more than 4 years of this exact behaviour seems rather disingenuous.
    
    I suspect two underlying reasons – the money supply has started to dry up, and they sense weakness and blood in the water so are going for the kill. The latter on the basis that if it bleeds, it leads and they enjoy the sport.
    
    I have zero sympathy, because I don’t trust them to do the right thing with the information they get anyway. She can keep crying crocodile tears.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:09am
    - Alan Wilkinson
      
      When Stuff opens its crap opinion writers to free criticism I’ll stop condemning its own arrogance.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:00am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Anna Fifield is part of the problem. Her newspaper has been more than happy to push the Labour line & suck on the public teat.
    
    Her article tells me that the rats are leaving the sinking ship.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:43am
  - Jim
    
    Ardern employs a similar mo to Justin Trudeau, by using state funded apparatus to discredit and censor any dissenting voices.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:54pm
- ClanMcleod
  
  That is Ardern’s only skill, crafting a PR image and brutally controlling everyone around her, but the mask has been slipping for a while and what it reveals is very ugly. She is a control freak and a narcissist. She is losing control and the public perception of her as “kind and caring” is being stripped away. I expect some bizarre behaviour coming in the next few months as she unravels.
  Yes, I know, you probably think the last 2 years were bizarre enough. I reckon the full meltdown will make it all seem rational.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:42am
  - Ruawai
    
    JA will be hoping for another disaster she can walk in and be the martyr of.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:01am
  - mawm
    
    Her real nastiness has not yet been seen. There has been a hint with her grinning while taking the unvaxxed’s lives away, the inappropriate smile while talking of suicides in NZ, etc. One day we’ll see a full-blown Hitler-like rant as she takes more away from people who don’t obey.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:27am
    - bronny1
      
      Apparently her staff have seen plenty of nasty rants.
      
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      February 5, 2022 4:53pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Indeed..
  
  But my favourite must be this supremely arrogant line from the Ministry of Health, asked about releasing data during an Omicron wave: “We will release additional information if it is determined that there is a need to do so.”
  
  and as the piece is written by Anna Fifield
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Fifield
  
  – someone with real world journalism experience – then it may serve as an example to other journalists in NZ to stop acting as the mouth-piece for Ardern and her ministers.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:48am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Maggy that is the level of Soviet Union style governance we are coming under summed up in a paragraph.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:41am
  - Jim
    
    I was pleasantly surprised by reading that article this morning, but saddened in the realisation that many people are not aware of the insidious decline of democratic freedoms in NZ since 2017.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:02pm
- Gravelroad
  
  And there is even a “cartoon” on $tuff this morning that is slightly critical of our authoritarian leader.
  Crafted by Tom Scott no less.
  It’s not funny though.
  Only funny aspect is that Scott dared to do it.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:51am
  - rouppe
    
    He forgot a wee armband…
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:00am
  - Sir Cullen's Sidekick
    
    Gravelroad – You call this a cartoon?
    
    8 4
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    February 5, 2022 10:05am
    - Gravelroad
      
      What would you call it then?
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:36am
  - greybeard
    
    Did you spot the spelling mistake in that cartoon?
    
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    February 5, 2022 4:38pm
    - Maggy Wassilieff
      
      And did you miss the PM’s missing fingers?
      
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      February 5, 2022 5:27pm
- redeye
  
  And for the first time I can remember Cindy is the butt of the cartoon in today’s Stuff.
  Not exactly a scolding but a start.
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/96288672/tom-scott-cartoons
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:58am
  - nathie
    
    Makes a change from when Stuff’s cartoonists used to draw halos around “Saint Jacinda”!
    
    https://natlib.govt.nz/records/40175328
    
    Expect Tom Scott to be “cancelled” and Sharon Murdoch to resume pro-Labour & Greens propaganda!
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:49am
    - Hollyfield
      
      Is it deliberate that he missed out the apostrophe in “I’m” and left an O off “too”. Is he making a point about Jacinda’s spelling, or did he just make the mistake himself.
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:39pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Yes indeed.
  OIA requests unanswered / and or heavily redacted so as to be unreadable.
  MP’s unable to reply to questions as lack of knowledge.
  Pass the Parcel is the order of the day.
  
  Main question is why are the Media questioning this now?
  
  What is obviously transparent is the ” Lack of Transparency” in this Government.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:07am
- curry4me
  
  Tricati: They could be applying pressure tactics to get more Cindy bucks in the next instalment. I doubt they’ve taken the red pill. Going by some of the content linked to from other posters; I wouldn’t be surprised if some of them have been swallowing ‘party pills’ though.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:39am
- Sir Cullen's Sidekick
  
  Tricati – This is very simple. The corrupt slaves of MSM are sending coded messages to the gummit to prepare the next installment of the bribe. That is all. There is no chance of the worm turning.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:04am
- rjay
  
  There’s your reason…two public holidays in a row on Mondays. Media don’t know what to say without the Monday briefing.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:44am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Only for The Herald. Outside of Akld, it’s different (‘‘twas ever thus).
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:24pm
- Blog-aholic
  
  That is how totalitarian governments work. Simple really, we have a totalitarian regime at the helm.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:14am
- Ra Henare
  
  The extra good thing about this opinion piece is that this a real journalist who is now Dominion-Post Editor!!!
  
  It has been said before.
  The media builds up people/groups until they dont get any more traction/clicks. Then they/media turn 180 degrees and turn their attention to tearing down said person/groups.
  
  Its how to gain attention from the punters which leads to more clicks, better advertising revenue.
  
  This has been media strategy for decades.
  
  Glad to see the tipping point has been reached and her with teeth and her gummint is now on the hit/click list.
  
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  February 5, 2022 2:09pm
TitanUranus

So now Chipkins sez, https://twitter.com/zelandica/status/1489526820047552516

“I have always been pretty sceptical about the models”

Not sceptical enough to resist paying $6m of our money per annum to the Covid Charlatans tho’?
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February 5, 2022 8:08am
- Frank the tank
  
  What’s happening is the narrative is breaking down. They are spinning like a top but slowly but surely they are losing the room
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:34am
- Salacious Crumb
  
  So Hipkins government, of which he is a senior minister, locked down the country twice and the largest city twice (including one stint of 107 days) based on modeling which he is sceptical of? And he’s the Covid response minister? Someone in this government needs to go to jail over this surely.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:50am
- Benedict Yu
  
  He pissed me off when he compared them to weather forecasts. New Zealand meteorologists are great and their weather forecasts are world class. All he did was insult meteorologists. He should apologise. ? Oh that’s right they don’t do apologies.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:51am
  - cmm
    
    Quite.
    
    … and I wonder how often they “tweak” the weather report to fuel the government fear machine? I doubt that happens, but it clearly happens for CV19 and Climate CHange modelling.
    
    NZ is one of the most challenging places in the world to do weather prediction and people come from all over the world to gain experience here.
    
    Our major weather patterns are governed by air coming up from the south almost directly in line with the Southern Alps.
    
    A few degrees to the west and it goes up the west coast. They get rain and Chch gets hot dry nor-westers. A few degrees to the east and it goes up the east coast. The West coast gets warm and dry while Chch gets rain.
    
    It is bloody challenging and they still get it right most of the time.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:33am
    - Don Beckett
      
      Our predominant air flow is westerly , tending southerly. Much of our weather comes from lower Australia, and the southern oceans.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:36am
      - Master Mariner
        
        Yes indeed Don,
        Actually Mid Latitudes are relatively easy to Forecast and NZ even more so with accurate stations and data from Aus.
        Equator Regions and High latitudes are more difficult especially near/over Land masses.
        Basically if you know the locations of 5 x Permanent highs then you can get a very accurate forecasts for most Regions.
        Ie Westerlies in NZ. These are driven by the the bottom of Highs in NZ.
        Without going into too much detail I fully agree NZ is one of the easiest too forecast, Apart from sporadic Intertropical Lows coming down and of course direction of Cyclones etc.
        
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        February 5, 2022 11:51am
      - DeepBlue
        
        Until it comes from the tropics.
        
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        February 5, 2022 12:37pm
    - gravedodger
      
      Adding to that challenge, NZ is a minor blip in millions of square Kms of ocean with very few reference points to garner accuracy in the signals they depend upon, cmm.
      Great summary though.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:38am
  - Sacha
    
    Let’s face it: ‘modelling’ is just speculation on possibilities and sometimes, with good luck, may in part come true.
    And let’s remember ‘rubbish in > rubbish out’ when it comes to computers.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:44am
  - Ra Henare
    
    Interesting perspective. Ever seen a NZ forecast that is accurate more than say 3 days out?
    
    That’s not the forecasters problem more that NZs geography greats “very tricky” weather.
    
    But I will say that with satellites and new technology the forecasts are getting better.
    
    Unlike the Covid models which are consistently wrong. So where are the 50,000 cases by Waitangi weekend?
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:17pm
- artemisia
  
  How strange that the Minister for Covid has only just come out with this scepticism. At a point when a(nother) model looks seriously ridiculous.
  
  Sorry Minister, Covid is your day job and you are expected to have your arms around it.
  
  I do notice that some are saying, well it was an international modeller who doesn’t understand NZ conditions, but nope, our modellers publicly endorsed the model. Egg. Face. Much. Except that they have gone very quiet on the topic.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:59am
  - DeepBlue
    
    Now they are saying infections in the community are a week or two ahead of reporting cases. This is to try and save face for another 10 days while the booster campaign rolls out with urgency.
    
    They knew that before, so they should have adjusted their models or their language.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:40pm
  - Jim
    
    Yep and in response to the reality being a million miles from the prophesy, we hear backpedaling Michael Baker on the radio today saying it’s “because the vaccinated are protecting the unvaccinated”.
    What? Please explain.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:16pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Not being mathematically minded but surely we should at the very least be given the “Indicators/ criteria ?” that came up with these numbers?
  
  At least we could get an idea to how they were thinking and what measures were used?
  
  That’s the very least all NZ’ers are owed after constant lockdown and uncertainity is the Math’s / logic behind the Models.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:13am
  - DeepBlue
    
    Nah, you’d then be able to run your own model on a spreadsheet.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:41pm
Cassandra

It’s the plant that’s the key component. This trust has a job on its hands. The evidence is that this myrtle variety came to NZ from Australia. They could register the macron – that might suffice.
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February 5, 2022 8:13am
Warren

I see our Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has returned to riddles to try and convince people to get the booster shot with ‘don’t delay get it today. Our Prime Minister obviously thinks the public are dumb and need kindergarten riddles to spruce up there imagination to understand her message.
https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/02/04/jacinda-ardern-on-boosters-dont-delay-get-it-today/
Mind you in saying this I don’t think she has a grasp on GDP, Inflation or what’s good the economy so I guess riddles is a good way for her to start.
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February 5, 2022 8:16am
- Master Mariner
  
  Hymmm.. Baffle with Bullshit.
  I’m always skeptical how some people communicate with lots of words where a few will do for effective communication.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:16am
- Benedict Yu
  
  It looks like it is working. I am at the large vaccination centre near Christchurch Airport. The place is packed.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:09pm
  - Benedict Yu
    
    Just figured out why the vaccine centre is packed. It is all the children getting vaccinated. Lots of them are here with 2 parents.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:40pm
Southern Raider

Absolute scum. Women steals doctors phone and credit cards while doctor is trying to save the life of the women’s friends 2 year old.

Bet she’s on a benefit and living in a KO house as well off the taxpayer
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February 5, 2022 8:18am
- Tony Stuart
  
  Even worse; as the child was dying, the woman went out on a spending spree:
  
  As hospital staff tried to save the life of a 2-year-old boy run over in a Rotorua driveway, a family member swiped a doctor’s two phones and a bank card and went on a spending spree.
  
  The child died a short time later but Melissa Herewini had already taken the bank card to four stores in Rotorua and bought alcohol, food, petrol, phone credit and cigarettes.
  
  Herewini, 34, pleaded guilty to the four charges of obtaining by deception when she appeared in the Rotorua District Court for the first time on January 13. Judge Maree Mackenzie sentenced her to one-year intensive supervision.
  
  https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/child-2-dies-after-rotorua-driveway-accident-family-member-steals-from-doctor-trying-to-save-childs-life/T74LM3KRWAIMSLWEP72CKLJQHE/
  
  Words fail me.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:51am
  - Opie
    
    And how about the punishment for doing such? Exactly nothing. In fact when they come round to “supervise” her they will probably grant some extra unemployment benefit so she can buy some more smokes.
    
    Absolute low life scum and the reason the majority of hard working kiwis are getting sick of this place.
    
    Cant think why we have a shortage of doctors…
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:03am
    - Alan Wilkinson
      
      Exactly. That obnoxious creep needs a major values adjusment. Ten months supervision is disgustingly inadequate. What on earth are these judges thinking?
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:04am
      - Paulus
        
        What can a judge do ?
        She is nothing, has nothing,and nothing for any reparation – and never will have – becoming the norm now and can only get worse for these have nots and many more to follow in the not too distant future. The middle classes are going towards the have not’s now, and this will become more obvious as costs etc escalate shortly.
        
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        February 5, 2022 1:48pm
  - Gravelroad
    
    It is understandable.
    This government with its legions of soft enablers, has made out that certain sections of our society are weak and needy due to colonisation, white privilege, racism and general “unfairness.”
    So for the opportunists, criminals and “hard done by” out there – it is state sanctioned payback time and no-one is off limits when it comes to ripping off others. They are owed this because……etc.
    Does anyone know what the sentence of “intensive supervision” entails?
    Is it having a pal go with you to the liquor store and petrol station to help you carry out the stuff you have bought with someone else’s coin?
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:34am
  - crikey
    
    Herewini eh! One of the special people from a culture for many of whom the attitude is ‘what’s yours is mine’.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:16am
  - Jim
    
    Sub human behaviour
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:20pm
- surfing
  
  Unsurprised to hear this is in Rotorua.
  
  No words to describe this. Exploiting the death of a child.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:05am
nathie

Are there similarities with Labour’s comms/media tactics and with Russian “disinformation tactics”?

With Labour:
*They never admit they are wrong (even when they are clearly wrong) and certainly never apologise.
*Repetition of misleading statements (propaganda) eg the repetition in 2020 and to late 2021 of “we (Labour) went hard and fast” (re various covid issues).
*Controlling the “message” (and access to officials).
*Lots of “propaganda” showing “Dear Leader” doing wonderful things in the community (but not actual governing).
*”Control” of the media (eg work “exclusively” with certain journalists eg think “Jessica/Tova” etc. Plus providing direct funding ($110m ) and new funding schemes requiring adherence to certain rules (think this new “public interest journalism fund or whatever it’s called.

I’m no expert on “Russian disinformation tactics” but found this article. Although some of it is not applicable to Labour’s situation, the overall objectives seem very similar:

Distinctive Features of the Contemporary Model for Russian Propaganda:

1. High-volume and multichannel
2. Rapid, continuous, and repetitive
3. Lacks commitment to objective reality
4. Lacks commitment to consistency.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/perspectives/PE198.html

There are some very intelligent people on here that post, can they think about this issue (over time too) and give their thoughts?
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February 5, 2022 8:19am
- Other_Andy
  
  “..the overall objectives seem very similar..’
  Give the Russians a break, it is a bit unfair to compare the NZ government media with the Russian media.
  Al least the Russian media will tell the truth at times and they actually love their country.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:52am
- nathie
  
  Also from that article:
  
  Why Is Rapid, Continuous, and Repetitive Propaganda Successful?
  
  1. First impressions are very resilient.
  2. Repetition leads to familiarity, and familiarity leads to acceptance.
  
  This seems to parallel Labour’s so-called “Podium of Truth” (2020/mid-2021) in which the population tuned in and “bought” what was being said. Which was reinforced by all NZ media channels (print, tv, radio).
  
  The population then becomes the “Team of 5 Million, which Labour then promotes and repeats as a phrase to make everyone feel they are part of something special (remember back in 2020/mid 2021 if anyone questioned the Podium of Truth they were ridiculed and “piled on”, particularly the Opposition). It wasn’t until the 3rd/4th quarter of 2021 did dissent start to take off and the podium of truth start to unravel.
  
  I think now, when the MSM mocked the initial protests to the formation of the Labour CoL govt in 2017, such as that protester (in Morrinsville) who carried aloft the sign saying “Pretty Communist” (or something) might have actually had a valid and reasonable point!
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:52am
  - Blog-aholic
    
    Why do you think they use Aotearoa constantly?
    
    They know they would never get agreement to change the countrys name, so they are using the old say it, say it, say it often tactic so that it becomes the name by repetition. Like all the other lies they tell. Repeat things often enough and they become a truth.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:19am
    - mawm
      
      “And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale — then the lie passed into history and became truth” – 1984, one of their user manuals.
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:46am
- ClanMcleod
  
  In recent years the comms out of Russia leave Western comms for dead.
  
  Utterly. Forget about “commies”. Compare Putin’s presence and speeches to Bojo and Biden. No comparison. He looks and talks like a statesman. The others are amateur clowns. Look at his Spokeswoman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova. Intelligent, professional, can handle off the cuff interviews and questions. Often smashes idiotic questions.
  I’m not saying “Russia good, West bad” – I don’t get into that sort of idiotic stuff. I’m observing a massive shift in the last 40 years.
  The old Soviet Union used to be laughable with their comms and public announcements and we rightly ridiculed them. My contention is that the position is totally reversed now. It’s the western comms that now sound made up, ludicrous and ridiculous word salads. Ardern’s “pulpit of truth” being a prime example.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:53am
  - nathie
    
    Fully agree … so could it be that Labour are copying this new Putin Propaganda model?
    
    (And I forgot about Speaker Mallard, protecting the PM when the heat is on and ejecting Opposition MP’s from the debating chamber or halting all further questioning), Never in NZ’s parliamentary history has such blatant control been exercised like this!
    
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    February 5, 2022 8:57am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      They may be trying to copy Russia but it’s a pathetic attempt. Ardern’s pulpit of truth is so obviously controlled as to be laughable. The gaffs she has made (only source of truth, two weeks of sustained propaganda) are amateur half hour.
      It didn’t take much to scratch the veneer and expose the fraud.
      Putin has been doing this for years and under constant scrutiny from a world audience, majority of it hostile. Between himself, Zakharova and Lavrov, their messaging is on point and professional. Whether it is accurate or not is irrelevant, but they are very good at what they do.
      
      Ardern and her bevy of circus clowns are like a Pink Floyd cover band. Utter shit at trying to copy the best.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:39am
      - Master Mariner
        
        “Whether it is accurate or not is irrelevant, but they are very good at what they do.”
        
        Yes indeed, So much so Germany is banning RT.
        
        https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/russia-target-german-media-response-german-ban-rt-tv-2022-02-02/
        
        Much the same as Al Jazeera with Saudi and UAE during the blockade of Qatar requested Al Jazeera be shut down.
        
        The Europeans are worried about the open and honest reporting from RT with a big following due to lack of “transparency and reporting” in there own countries.
        
        I find it Ironic that I have to use RT / Al Jazeera to gain further insights around the world as my own news feed is shite. And even more concern is the news feed matches your Geographical location.
        ie Google News in NZ and say Singapore are different. Why ?
        
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        February 5, 2022 10:01am
      - Jack5
        
        Maria Zakharova can dance, too:
        
        https://youtu.be/B-EgzOdJ5S8
        
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        February 5, 2022 10:53am
      - nathie
        
        @ Jack5 – our Foreign Minister Mahuta to have a “dance-off”, when they next meet? 😉
        
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        February 5, 2022 11:57am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Perhaps Ardern is NZ’s version of A Dear Leader
  
  Read Anna Fifield’s opinion piece in “Stuff” today.
  
  Fifield has written a biography of Kim Jong Un
  (based on her numerous visits to N.Korea)
  
  ” Kim’s life is swathed in myth and propaganda,”
  https://www.hachette.co.nz/book/?id=the-great-successor-9781529387230
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:10am
  - nathie
    
    Heh, perhaps Ms Fifield could write a book on NZ’s very first “Dear Leader”.
    
    She could become rich, very rich, particularly if a “concerned” Labour pay her handsomely NOT to publish the book!
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:02pm
- Master Mariner
  
  In my mind its as simple as this,
  
  “Take away the common enemy and all you get is Chaos”.
  
  Ask yourself this, What is the ( Current) common enemy ?
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:22am
ecco

Walked around the Auckland cbd and some of the commercial districts in the suburbs and can see many businesses are on the edge due to Ardern’s lockdowns up here. In particular some of the clothing retailers must be close to the cliff, trying to liquidate summer stock, after being made to close most of the busy season, thanks to Arden and her lockdown obsession.

I’d say if some of these retailers can’t move their summer stock it will be pretty touch and go whether they survive. Went into one longstanding shop where the owner was basically saying to customers ‘make an offer on any item’. Absolutely heartbreaking. There are huge red sale signs on Smith and Caughey windows, if you are in Auckland go and support them. Their end of Queen St has taken a thrashing under Ardern and Goff.

I saw a news item on tv3 about how the Christchurch businesses are doing it tough. They ought to come up to the Auckland area if they want to see doing it tough.

In addition to that Ardern has scared witless a certain portion of the population who are now NOT frequenting the hospo outlets nor even leaving the house in some instances!

One of the Auckland airport managers was on Heather’s radio show yesterday afternoon saying that allowing overseas visitors in in October BUT insisting on 7 day isolation is no use at all in signing up any overseas airlines to put NZ back on their routes. Even Auckland Airport Ltd is under threat from Ardern’s lack of foresight. The opening up announcements this week were just more smoke and mirrors. Sadly.

So the point I’m making is that this is NZ’s worse nightmare, a bunch of student politicians, with no commercial experience whatsoever, getting into power, with absolutely no handbrake on them, not even NZF. What you see is the demolition of the NZ economy under the auspices of covid but really due to sheer incompetence and lack of commercial nous. Think Ardern, Robertson, Clark, Faafoi, Twyford, Nash.

I predict a huge brain drain of our brightest and best very soon, and high taxes for many years to come. That 1.39% so called employment insurance levy, which is actually just another tax by stealth is just the start. Oz looking like a distinct possibility at some stage…
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February 5, 2022 8:20am
- I remember when
  
  When are we going to get to learn how many retail and business owners have lost all of their life savings.
  Effectively, back to starting out again – with reduced life expectancy.
  Many who have not yet ‘gone under’ will be on the edge of doing so.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:06am
- ClanMcleod
  
  There is a school of thought that the controlled demolition of the economy is no accident. That Ardern as a graduate of the Klaus Schwab and WEF Young Global Leader programme (along with her twin, Trudeau) – is actively helping to drive the Great Reset advocated by the WEF. That she is fully onboard with the UN Agenda 2030 and the Green New Deal and that she is using covid as a smokescreen to help push all of the above as well as digital IDs for everything in the future.
  
  Of course, this is all conspiracy theory nonsense, except for the parts that are easily verifiable. Which are all parts. Whoops, not a conspiracy theory after all!
  I know it would be great to write all of her actions off as incompetence, but I don’t think anybody could possibly be that stupid.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:07am
  - JibberJabber
    
    Heh, Conspiracy Theories are the new Spoiler Alerts.
    
    https://twitter.com/NessNzmade/status/1489686944690802688/photo/1
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:10am
  - Jim
    
    I’d like to see the media ask Robbo about TGR again, I’m not sure if he’s an incompetent finance minister, or a competent and devout TGR disciple.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:27pm
- Bridgenag
  
  What about the landlords with all their costs?
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:11am
- Opie
  
  Yep, I’m aiming towards a move to Australia as well. While their covid policies have flaws as well eg WA and their draconian governor and stupid vaccine mandates etc, but at least you earn proper money and the cost of living is significantly better.
  
  The other big difference aus vs nz is the relationship with the indigenous people. You watch them roll out Uncle Alan or one of the other elders before a big sports match and they are humble, respectful (of people and land) and welcoming. Actually pretty cool.
  
  In NZ it’s literally a war dance and a fuck you, give us some more money. That filters through to the rest of society and with the likes of he puapua this will only get worse. Some politicians literally said that opening the border was racist. And we let that make the news…
  
  If labour get in again NZ will never recover. The other crowd may be able save the country but it will be a few tough years of recovery.
  
  Been here 40 plus years and never thought I would leave. I’m mortgage free and pay around 40k a year in tax. I reckon I’m fairly representative of the types that will be leaving.
  
  Why would you stay?
  
  Is it safe here? Not now.
  
  Will my kids be able to buy a house? Doubt it.
  
  Is it a civil inclusive society based on democracy? Not anymore, it’s never been more divided – I have never seen so much anger and hatred here.
  
  Hard times make hard men.
  Hard men make easy times.
  Easy times make soft men.
  Soft men make hard times.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:26am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    Yeah, but it’s Australia
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:27pm
  - Jim
    
    Agree 100%, this manipulative government has deliberately used division (racial, cultural, regional, medical etc) whilst always appearing so benevolent with its platitudes, hand wringing and fake smiles.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:36pm
- curry4me
  
  ecco: Oz is a reasonable prospect for anyone under 40. They need to remember to buy a super plan take out medical insurance, and give Victoria a miss.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:48am
  - Ian Boag
    
    All true.
    
    OTOH the only contact with the govt safety net is medicare, you don’t get to vote, the kids will not be able to get student loans and a few other odds and sods.
    
    I understand the immigration department is currently about as clogged up as ours, so residency/citizenship is a bit of a long term (and expensive) thing.
    
    Just saying ….
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:41am
- Master Mariner
  
  “I predict a huge brain drain of our brightest and best very soon, and high taxes for many years to come”
  Yes indeed, Its already happening. More people left NZ than entered last year.
  “Quotas” on skilled migrants not met. ( Who would of thought //)
  I honestly think this is what worries ( Or should do) this Government the most is the Brain Drain and why would the younger people not take off.
  Mad if you don’t.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:06am
  - Ra Henare
    
    You missed the cunning plan.
    Make NZ a pain in the rectum so that more will leave than arrive.
    
    Negative population growth.
    This will free up housing.
    Reverse the supply and demand curve-ie house prices dropping
    
    Voila, housing shortage resolved!
    Headline.
    Labour policies resolve Housing problem.
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:28pm
- bennerg
  
  “In addition to that Ardern has scared witless a certain portion of the population who are now NOT frequenting the hospo outlets nor even leaving the house in some instances!”
  
  I would normally have been skeptical until yesterday a friend called by and his daughter was not leaving the house – bought food and necessities online.
  
  Another unintended consequence.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:08am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  I doubt that leaving the country to avoid higher taxes would play out very well. As far as I know, every OECD country has pulled the same QE trick as ourselves, & all of them will have to pay it back somehow.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:49am
  - Ra Henare
    
    Just a small point QE is printing money. NOt taking out a loan.
    
    So QE does not need paying back.
    
    Thats the reason for high inflation.
    and was predicted by most thinking economists
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:30pm
- slernz
  
  I agree with most of what you say. Scores of New Zealanders have been brainwashed and many live in fear. Miss Ardern has done this but it is collateral damage of her overriding Covid strategy. It is not logical, but her strategy is to have no Covid deaths, or as few as possible. That’s it! The damage of a such a strategy is now becoming clear but she will not waver.
  
  And her strategy is quite hard to argue against in reality. If media/public criticise her she can say “this government weren’t prepared to see any New Zealanders die. We use all means possible to keep Aoteroa safe and alive.”
  
  If someone asks about business closures etc… was it worth it? She can easily counter, “how many deaths would have been acceptable to you?”
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:04am
- mawm
  
  ecco – I disagree with you on Smith and Caughey. They are ordinary retail and there is no government mandate on excluding the unvaccinated but they have chosen to allow only those with a vaccine passport to enter. By doing this they are complicit. They do not have my sympathy if they go bust. However I will support all the mom and pop small businesses to the hilt.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:00pm
CJames

Why does there seem to be so little in the NZ media about the Canadian truckers? There is only a tiny piece in this morning’s Dom Post, effectively parroting their PM’s comments about they were all the “ists” and “phobics”. From what I gather from other sources, Justin hasn’t been seen – officially he has Covid despite being boosted a month ago. There hasn’t been any flights sneaking in from Canada seeking political asylum from Jacinda has there?
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February 5, 2022 8:25am
- JibberJabber
  
  https://twitter.com/TheRealKeean/status/1489676948259303428
  “Our goal is to end the demonstration.”
  Funny how the Cops were never this concerned about the BLM protests and violence that trashed cities, but when the supply chain of Doughnuts is threatened it’s a National emergency?
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:40am
- MCōs
  
  Hidden due to low comment rating. Click here to see.
  There was probably not much news in Canada about the various farmers protests here in NZ either.
  Essentially they are domestic issues.
  The type of protest going on in Canada are a dime a dozen. They become news when the police or army is used to clear them off the streets, as happened in Australia.
  I see some people are trying to get something similar going in NZ, starting up North today. Let’s see if it’s reported in Canada.
  https://www.facebook.com/groups/1876770255843196/permalink/1879197788933776/
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:49am
  - bennerg
    
    I’d say it became newsworthy when the size became obvious. But at the same time it became a threat to Trudeau and so he news was shut down.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:10am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Trying to compare the Canadian protest with the NZ farmer protest is ridiculous. NZ is a pimple on the arse of the world and with a tiny population. The farmers drove about 10kms each.
    The Canadian truckers is massive. Conservative estimates put it at 80km long, 50,000 people. It has garnered massive support everywhere it goes and Trudeau ran away and hid.
    Dime a dozen? You are as delusional as Ardern’s communication team. They too think that just because they say something it will be accepted as true, but most people see it for what it is – totally transparent nonsense.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:12am
  - Rodion Raskolnikov
    
    This isn’t a “domestic issue” at all, which is why the MSM coverage is so scant and, where it does appear, is so deliberately misleading. These events are of global importance. They are a direct challenge to the globalised system, and so pose a direct existential threat to that system. The authorities recognise this circumstance. This and other protests around the world are manifestations of a popular uprising and so are threatening the authority and legitimacy of the various governments.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:50am
- Inandout
  
  CJ you won’t see any information on Canada because our Labour media is almost non existent to the many of us who look exclusively online for news. I can imagine the great majority of NZers have fibre now so hardly ever see a newspaper or need Stuff anymore. I looked at Fox last night and saw a sad Biden being slowly shuffling off stage led by his nurse wife. I saw Zucker resigning from an almost dead CNN and a Canadian trucker being interviewed on Crowder. I am among a huge majority of kiwis who have left our MSM way behind.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:51am
- ClanMcleod
  
  Because they aren’t permitted to talk about it unless it is to vilify it. That’s what 115 million gets you. Lots of shills and repeating stations.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:09am
  - Rodion Raskolnikov
    
    The worst possible scenario is that the popular revolt against governments catches on everywhere, which is why, if it is covered at all, it is to demonise and to discredit. The imposition of Covid mandates has been the catalyst, but there is decades of the effects of globalisation behind this. The ball of manifest political discontent has begun rolling now, and I don’t think they will be able to stop it.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:55am
- Nickc2
  
  NZ is a News Void!
  To know what’s happening around the world and to get an unbiased view of NZ’s News, one has to go online (off Shore) or watch Foreign News Outlets on TV.
  However, if one wants Govt/Racial spun News or to know Who’s doing Who in the Celebrity Zoo, NZ’s MSM has it all.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:31am
  - Jim
    
    NZ msm has always offered a somewhat parochial view, perhaps because of its small budget. However in recent years any offering of international news is usually cherry picked opinion pieces typically supporting a woke left leaning world view. That’s why not many kiwis in the street will appreciate significant news this last few days, such as the UKGOV having been forced to drop NHS staff vaccine mandates.
    Meanwhile in a land far far away called Ardernville their lived a Princess………..
    
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    February 5, 2022 5:10pm
- Master Mariner
  
  Same as Joe Roggan makes world news and Truckers zilch.
  
  The narrative is ( Must be ) controlled.
  
  Cancel culture alive and well.
  
  Its one and the same when you think about.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:11am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    It’s why Rogan is now under attack from all the usual suspects. He’s a major threat. His audience dwarfs the nearest legacy media outlet, Tucker Carlson, by 5 to 1.
    The rise of social media as a news platform threatens the controlled propaganda of mainstream media. Hence the attacks on it all around the world. There is a Bill being pushed through the UK parliament and another in NZ. Worded in a way to allow the ptb to cancel anything with a vague assertion that it is “misinformation” or “dangerous”. What is truly dangerous is the amount of power forcibly taken by government under false pretenses.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:51am
    - Master Mariner
      
      Couldn’t agree more.
      
      Much the same as Edward Snowden reporting from Russia. Incidently he was interviewed by Rogan and a very good one at that.
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:05pm
    - Jim
      
      Very concerning for the freedom of speech and democracy. I can imagine our leader gleefully establishing a Ministry of Truth.
      
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      February 5, 2022 5:16pm
- ClanMcleod
  
  Bad Cattitude discussing how much Trudeau looks like his father and apparently the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Very funny, check it out.
  
  https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/kitten-corner-just-like-dad/comments
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:14am
  - Nickc2
    
    There are times when he reminds me of Mick Jagger. Now how did that happen?
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:31pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Canadian Truckers.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/e0ieczahzk0o5c5/Canadian%20Truckers.jpg?dl=0
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February 5, 2022 8:29am
Weetbix3ways

NZ Freedom Convoy starts tomorrow.

Come out and join for a leg, or wave and show your support if you see us going by!
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February 5, 2022 8:30am
- ClanMcleod
  
  Best of luck to all involved. This country needs to hold these idiots to account and get them out of office asap.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:11am
  - Nickc2
    
    ……and out of our lives forever!
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:33am
  - MCōs
    
    You mean you’re not involved?
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:19am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      Are you asking out of concern or to offer support MCōs? That’s nice of you. Cheers.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:53am
john1234

“Intensive supervision”. Wow, that will teach her a lesson she’ll forget after the first Woodstock:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/child-2-dies-after-rotorua-driveway-accident-family-member-steals-from-doctor-trying-to-save-childs-life/T74LM3KRWAIMSLWEP72CKLJQHE/
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February 5, 2022 8:31am
- cmm
  
  Yup, it’s not even home detention.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:38am
- bennerg
  
  Slap in the face for all front line responders…. should have been at least 18 months no parole.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:12am
kevn

@CJames… I gather there has been a softening in Canada. No tax on unvaxxed.
The virtual zero media coverage in NZ overall is very suspicious. Must be a very meaningful and effective protest.
dailytelegraph.co.nz has some info.
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February 5, 2022 8:31am
- Frank the tank
  
  The majority of Canadians are swinging behind the truckers. Like here everyone is well over the plandemic; the opposition has elected someone from the right to lead and otherwise Ardern’s BFF is slowly but surely becoming politically isolated. I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t survive the term
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:39am
  - MCōs
    
    Maybe not so much in Ottawa
    https://twitter.com/ottawapolice/status/1488914640214056971?s=21
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:35am
    - Frank the tank
      
      Ottawa is Wellington on steroids. Hardly a bellwether.
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:19pm
- curry4me
  
  kevn: Yes, some provincial governors have caved. The Conservatives have a new interim leader, Candice Bergen. She has a backbone, unlike her predecessor.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:51am
  - emmess
    
    Yes, it will be very interesting to see the polls in Canada over the next few weeks and months if the Conservative Party stick with Bergen
    
    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2022/02/03/canada-tories-elect-pro-trucker-mp-as-leader-after-sacking-moderate/
    
    Currently, the Conservative and Liberal Parties are polling about equally
    https://338canada.com/
    
    But this would hide a huge percentage of people who are just so disgusted with the whole political class in the last two years that they would not bother to vote.
    I am picking a dramatic change, if a real choice is offered.
    This will provide a clarity for the National Party and ACT parties here. The ‘we will manage tyranny better’ strategy has failed abysmally.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:04am
  - mawm
    
    Hopefully Bergen is not another Schwab clone. She certainly stands out when compared to other leaders of the anglophone countries – Ardern, Morrison, Andrews (Victoria), McGowan (WA), Gunner (NT), Trudeau, Biden, Johnson.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:12pm
Yvette

Jacinda Ardern, Kelvin Davis deny COVID-19 border reopening decision was made without Māori consultation
… Davis also pushed back against the accusations. “I disagree entirely with that,” he told reporters.
“We’ve been engaging with Māori since March 2020.

However the same article points out –
… The Waitangi Tribunal released a scathing ruling of the Government’s response in December last year, saying Māori were put at risk, particularly due to the initial blanket approach to the vaccine rollout.
The Government, after calls for change, opted for a whānau-centred approach to the vaccine rollout for Māori and is contributing millions of dollars to providers.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/02/jacinda-ardern-kelvin-davis-deny-covid-19-border-reopening-decision-was-made-without-m-ori-consultation.html

The truth regarding consultation may lie in the Waitangi Tribunal condemnation, the Government changing approach and contributing (more) millions of dollars to it.

The crux of the Waitangi Tribunal’s scathing ruling that Māori were put at risk, particularly due to the initial blanket approach to the vaccine rollout, would appear – from other sources – to centre on the lower life expectancy of Maori, and that while a 65 band of the non-Maori population may represent “older”, more vulnerable, people, a corresponding band of Maori should be lower than 65.
So promotions should have perhaps advised initially essential workers (or whoever was first) are now eligible, then Maori and Pacifika 55 and non-Maori 65

Questions of exactly differentiating ethnicity – to establish if your actual genes, heritage or circumstances say you will die earlier – could have been ignored as long as people got vaccinated.

So, with the degree of consultation claimed, why did that not happen?
Can Jacinda Ardern or Kelvin Davis explain that?
Has any journalist got the intestinal fortitude to actually ask them … now?
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February 5, 2022 8:35am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  51% of Maori are obese. There’s the primary reason for their bad life expectancy. 72% P.I. 32% European, 19% Asian
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:18am
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  Well, they asked Kelvin for his opinion. Doesn’t that count?
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:29pm
  - Nickc2
    
    His opinion is what he’s told it is. Must follow the party line and sing praises to Dear Leader and salute the Maori Flag and all that stuff.
    Let’s face it, he’s anyone’s Glove Puppet.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:30pm
kevn

@CJ… Things getting tricky in Canberra as well.
A truckers NZ protest planned for 8th Feb.
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February 5, 2022 8:37am
- Other_Andy
  
  Who would have predicted 2 years ago that the countries with the most draconian covid measures and little respect for basic human rights would be Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
  
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  February 5, 2022 8:57am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    And the US? Only slightly mitigated by the fact that independent states have some autonomy. Five Eyes. The UK seems to be the only outlier. Why?
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:16am
  - JibberJabber
    
    Western Australia.
    An “ausweis schnell” moment…
    https://twitter.com/apexworldnews/status/1489588736941768706
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:16am
    - ClanMcleod
      
      How sick is that. Australia really has slid into a hole. That cop should be suspended pending dismissal and potentially charged with being a disgusting pos.
      
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      February 5, 2022 9:28am
      - mawm
        
        He should have been physically turfed out of the church by the congregation, maybe even taken behind the woodshed.
        
        “And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family?” – Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archpelago
        
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        February 5, 2022 12:18pm
  - Stellaboxer
    
    Deeply held feelings of inadequacy so must try hard to show the old countries that they not only measure up but the measure up sooo much more.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:45am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    Welcome to socialism – slowly creeping in!
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:02am
  - emmess
    
    To be fair
    Some countries in Europe are a bit worse.
    Austria and Germany are introducing mandatory vaccines
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:07am
  - Nickc2
    
    Ok, let’s mitigate:
    (a) Australia’s Covid fiasco is largely dealt with by individual states, and
    (b) Canada and NZ have a common theme: Idiots in charge.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:02pm
Frank the tank

Sooo with the NZ junior surf lifeguard champs being shit canned we as a family are up to 5 major sporting championships being cancelled due to mind numbingly stupid political rules. That doesn’t include all the minor day events that now number probably in the mid 30s.

This government hates sports and anyone having fun. The silver lining is with every cancelled event further support and goodwill is lost.
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February 5, 2022 8:42am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I think you will discover many families are in a similar position where their youngsters are having sporting and cultural (music, drama, travel exchanges) activities severely curtailed.
  
  Ardern & her cronies seem to think that a summer of bbqs and a few music festivals are all that youngsters need.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:16am
  - Hollyfield
    
    It does show the mindset of the government. Their focus is entirely on allowing people to attend music festivals for a couple of weeks in January, and on DJs. I get those activities are very popular with some people, but not with anyone I know. Yeah, yeah, I’m not that demographic. But just what percentage of the population goes to these festivals? And what percentage is more focused on other things that apparently don’t exist to this government? Are the government’s focus groups made entirely of festival attendees?
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:25am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    It’s her lack of life experience. Despite being the mother of a small child, she still sees herself as a player about town (or adjacent there to); therefore music festivals are a-go but family (dependent children) events are just not on her radar.
    
    To be fair, it’s not just her. The cult in recent years for youthful leaders has undermined humanity’s long tradition of the wisdom of elders, precisely because life throw up varied challenges & the more of them you’ve seen, the better placed you are when they crop up again.
    
    Although, it’s a bell shaped curve. Joe Biden has clearly slid into the long tail.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:59am
- cmm
  
  I have some interest in hockey as my son was playing at rep level until he had a head injury on the field and had to stop. The major Chch hockey field is just around the corner from me. It is basically a ghost town. It used to be busy the whole week end as well as every evening. Now I don’t see any games going on when I drive/ride past. There might be a few – but not when I’ve gone past.
  
  What has happened to those kids that start playing hockey at age 5 and continue playing until they’re in their 60s playing masters? Some playing socially, some at rep level?
  
  Two or three years off and I expect many will never go back.
  
  Rinse and repeat for other sports.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:47am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    All summer I’ve had to book lanes to swim in Olympic Pool at Gisborne (code red requirement)
    ..but day after day, it is just me and my 80-year swim buddy and perhaps 1 or 2 others lane-swimming.
    
    Just a hell of a waste of a great resource.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:03am
    - cmm
      
      It would be interesting to see the change in clothing buying in the last two years.
      
      I suspect more fashionable clothing is down and more comfortable clothing (sweatpants and stretch fabric) has increased.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:13am
  - mawm
    
    All the (un)intended consequences of the Great Reset by the WEF/Herr Schwab/Dr Gates. Society will take years to recover. I expect to see the Karens adopting cotton masks as a fashion accessory for years to come.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:25pm
    - Nickc2
      
      Three-piece bikinis? Striptease to take off the Covid Mask last? Geez, that’ll be a surprise package.
      Wait till the Karens hear of this!
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:53pm
- curry4me
  
  Frank the tank: Also the Leeston Fete, which was scheduled for late March.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:53am
- Master Mariner
  
  “This government hates sports and anyone having fun”
  Yep, BTW Sports is “Old School”, Music and Art is the new thing.
  Or at least to MIQ “Special” access.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:17am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  All controlled by the Labour fun police
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:06am
- rjay
  
  Minister of arts?
  Minister of sport?
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:08am
I remember when

The Queen marks 70 years on the throne tomorrow.
Sunday, 6th February.
Obviously she will say to Maori that this is a sign that they are partners with the crown.
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February 5, 2022 8:55am
Tauhei Notts

I have seen no comment in the main stream media about David Seymour’s State of the Nation Speech.
I thought it was brilliant. The way the MSM avoid that speech might mean that my judgement of it was wrong.
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February 5, 2022 8:58am
- Scott
  
  No it means your judgement was right. Let’s face it. Our media is bought and paid for. Looking at Stuff and Newshub for criticism of the government by an opposition leader would be like looking in the pages of Pravda for criticism of the Soviet communist party.
  
  If Seymour’s speech does get traction then look for the media to describe his speech as racist.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:14am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Have you never had the feeling that you are right and the MSM is a load of bought sycophants?
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:18am
- Souvlaki
  
  This was on Stuff after the speech…which at least is a start :
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/127674468/acts-david-seymour-mocks-red-queen-jacinda-ardern-in-stateofnation-speech
  This , coupled with Editor Fifields attack editorial against arrogance, is at least encouraging….perhaps they have found the conscience at last?
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:52am
  - ClanMcleod
    
    It would be great if they did discover a conscience. Or a spine. Or some moral fortitude. Sadly, NZ mainstream media is a feral cesspit of self interested presstitutes.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:58am
Souvlaki

Helen Clarks former chief of staff ,Mike Munro, although staunchly partisan ,makes some salient points ( behind paywall NZ Herald) about Luxon’s need to swot up ahead of time for PMQ’s.
I am an ACT supporter, but I hope Luxon can retain/ improve his recent popularity rise…which IMO is in large part due to the ABBA ( Anyone BUT Bloody Ardern) factor at play as she unravels in every direction !
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February 5, 2022 9:03am
- JimBobJoe
  
  Mike Munro… hmmm.
  
  Now wasn’t he at the head of the drive to get Jacinda all over the womans mags back in 2015/26 as positioning for a run at the leadership? Part of the creation of the myth of Jacinda as a wonderful young woman wanting the best for NZ and the world. When in fact she is a hard core socialist – once the leader of the old CCCP international youth league aka union of International Union of Socialist Youth – bent on tearing down the West..
  
  So Mike Munro … how about you step up and accept the blame for being a key part in creating the worst, most destructive government behind the worst PM that NZ has ever seen…. of course you wont as hard core socialist like you are willing for others to pay what ever price you think is acceptable so you can have a socialist utopia…
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:13am
Marcus Vinicius

The NZ Herald says in a story about the Auckland light rail that:

“The Government is considering a possible Auckland light rail tax of $1000 a year that will hit working-class families in several Labour seats.”

Robbo was asked about this possible new tax and didn’t answer questions.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/aucklands-working-class-could-cop-1000-light-rail-tax-being-considered-by-government/ZPTQBA2YANQQLWA7TZ5BTZBXYY/

What a wacky governement this is.
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February 5, 2022 9:11am
- Hard Cheese
  
  Robbo was asked about this possible new tax and didn’t answer questions.
  
  Hmmm…I can’t call it a new tax, the subjects don’t like that. Jacinda has already used “levy”, can’t use that. Comrade Phil has used “targeted rate” a lot, maybe not wise. “Contribution” probably no good, Phil uses that one a lot too. Used “insurance” recently, that’s out….hmmm…might be able to get away with “duty”…if I throw in a few “fair share’s”, and ask them to “chip in a little” they might not notice…
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:39am
  - Marcus Vinicius
    
    Some alternatives to saying the dirty 3 letter T word for Robbo and Labour could be:
    
    tariff · duty · toll · excise · impost · assessment · tribute · tithe · charge · fee · liability · dues
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:37am
    - nathie
      
      “Tithe” seems most appropriate!
      
      That term hasn’t been used before (by Labour) and it seems most appropriate (of Labour) … with them being kind of like Robin Hood but in reverse!
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:43am
      - Maggy Wassilieff
        
        As long as we don’t call them “love offerings”
        
        https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/destiny-church-demands-more-than-tithe-former-members-say/H3JGRQWRWLQE3X4NB6OCSYG7VU/
        
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        February 5, 2022 2:52pm
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      koha with menaces, compulsory gift, oxygen duty,
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:11pm
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    100 years to the week from the release of Ulysses, good use of the inner voice!
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:04am
- greybeard
  
  I am looking forward to their definition of “walking distance”, as this seems to be the basis for the scheme.
  “Walking distance” for some would be out to their front gate.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:42am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  What is it with the loony left and trains?
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:14am
  - Master Mariner
    
    Same as 4 year olds and Thomas the Tank Engine I’m guessing.//
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:11pm
  - mawm
    
    They watched too much Dr Zhivago and have retinal image of the train travelling through the snow….and Julie Christie.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:33pm
  - Nickc2
    
    Come on Steve, give em a break FFS, they’ve just graduated from Kindy.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:25pm
- Gordon Shumway
  
  It’s yet another Auckland-based targeted rate. Hotels have been banging on about it and are now going to the Supreme Court (they won in the Court of Appeal) because the one targeting them was so comically unfair. EVERONE should care about the hoteliers winning in court. Goff is taking the p1ss by moving as much expenditure as possible under “targeted” rates so that he can claim he’s kept “general rates” low. This Goff/Robertson plan is just another example of that and National/ACT should be telling Auckland Council to live within its means.
  
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  February 5, 2022 1:57pm
Tony Stuart

Some random, impertinent questions:

* When did Chris Hipkins first become sceptical of claims made by COVID modellers?
* Was Hipkins sceptical of the very first claim by modeller Shaun Hendy that 80,000 New Zealanders would die if COVID got unchecked into New Zealand?
* Did Chris Hipkins ever share his scepticism with the Prime Minister, the Director-General of Health and his Cabinet colleagues?
* Did Hipkins make decisions in his capacity of COVID Response Minister in any way influenced by information about which he was sceptical?
* What has been the total cost to New Zealand (financial, health, social) of Cabinet decisions based on modelling information he now concedes he was sceptical about?
* Does Chris Hipkins stand by every decision he made based on information provided by modellers, and if not, will he resign as COVID Response Minister?
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February 5, 2022 9:16am
- ClanMcleod
  
  Wouldn’t those be wonderful questions to ask in a live, public forum. The answers I predict would be excruciating.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:19am
  - amospicton
    
    Yes we use to have journalists like Ian Fraser, Lindsay Perigo and even Paul Holmes and Mike Hosking who’d ask those questions. And even more to the point, we had politicians who’d turn up and deal with it. Now we have a PM who is too busy for Hosking but available for the groupies on The Edge or whatever it is. Pathetic, non-transparent, anti democratic and cowardly.
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:54am
- greybeard
  
  Hopefully Hosking will follow this up as it was on his show that Hipkins first aired his apparent scepticism.
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:43am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Perhaps it is time for the NZ Government to start engaging folks who can understand the limits of their models…before getting their lackeys to rush off to the MSM with alarmist projections.
  
  https://thespinoff.co.nz/society/27-01-2022/will-we-really-see-50000-daily-omicron-infections-by-waitangi-weekend
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:50am
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    These are of course predictions and should be viewed as such, however they have been given credence by New Zealand’s leading experts including University of Otago professors Nick Wilson and Michael Baker: “Our impression is that this work is of high quality and should be considered by NZ policy-makers … [it’s] an organisation with a very strong track record for analysing health data (with some of the best epidemiologists, health data scientists and computer scientists in the world).”
    
    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/460299/omicron-modelling-suggests-nz-could-face-peak-of-80-000-daily-infections
    
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    February 5, 2022 9:54am
  - cmm
    
    But this is their time in the limelight.
    
    Mathematical modelling is hardly sexy. To be blunt, it doesn’t get you laid.
    
    But then comes a pandemic and these people become rockstars. Huge ego rush. The more salacious and click-baity their claims, the more the media wants to quote them and the more the PM’s communications office links them in to reporting and what is said.
    
    And it’s not just ego either. It’s hard cash too. Millions of dollars have given to these people to run their numbers because they are what those in charge of the purse strings want to hear.
    
    So guess what happens? A thumb on the scale here, an extra tweaked coefficient there…
    
    In a year or so, the rock star life will be over. Beige cardigans again. Back to climate modelling, I suppose.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:03am
    - Alan Wilkinson
      
      For sheer brazen incompetence epidemiologists have proven hard to beat.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:11am
      - Ra Henare
        
        Alan, with all due respect SOME epidemiologists.
        
        Swedens response was driven by their medical chief(epidemiologist)
        Taiwans response was supported by their Vice President(world class epidemiologist)
        Denmarks return to normal. Driven by their epidemiologist.
        
        Its just the selected NZ mouthpieces(Baker, Jackson) that are tits.
        Funny we don’t hear from Sir David Skeggs who was talking sense last year. OR some others. Maybe they are not toeing the establishment line.
        
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        February 5, 2022 3:37pm
      - Alan Wilkinson
        
        @RH, sure but the “profession” will rightly be judged by those seen to have spoken for it and in the Anglophone world that has been dire.
        
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        February 6, 2022 7:45am
    - Master Mariner
      
      “In a year or so, the rock star life will be over.”
      
      Yep and a life of mediocracy and resentment from collegues and Public alike.
      
      Like they say, Everyone gets 15 mins of Fame.
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:23am
    - Biscuit
      
      cmm, remember the ‘We’re IM-POOR-TINT’ starry-eyed expressions the ‘modellers’ all wore in the latter half of 1999 as they made their dire predictions as to what calamities would happen when Y2K happened?
      
      Global computers, you may recall, were gonna be thrown into chaos with the change of date.
      
      Nowt happened.
      
      There may have been a couple of fatal cases of paper burns as rash citizens ripped their old calendars up a tad too lustily … cue headlines like TWO DIE IN BOLIVIA FROM Y2K … but, by and large, everyone survived.
      
      We’re fast approaching 22/2/22. I wonder if any of them will poke their (embarrassed) faces/rear ends up and predict (another) Doomsday then?
      
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      February 5, 2022 10:52am
    - Gravelroad
      
      There was a modelling “professional” on the HDPA show yesterday shuffling uncomfortably under the questioning of how modelling works.
      To put it at its most simplistic, he said that what he and his colleagues did was to mock up a range of scaled scenarios of what might happen with a pandemic. It was all hypothetical.
      It wasn’t their fault if certain people -ie politicians with an agenda to maintain – seized upon a model which suited them and ignored the other possibilities.
      So perhaps the Labour Party and their MoH cronies just trawled through all the various modellers scenarios until they found the preferred options and just went with those no matter if they were accurate or not.
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:02am
      - ClanMcleod
        
        They paid Te Punaha Matatini (Hendy and co) to produce the original models for them. The models they presented reference the discredited Ferguson from Imperial College London in numerous places. They stated that their modeling concurred with Ferguson’s, hence the 80,000 dead figure used by Ardern to start the circus.
        
        Here is a link to the original report from Hendy and co.
        
        https://cpb-ap-se2.wpmucdn.com/blogs.auckland.ac.nz/dist/d/75/files/2017/01/Supression-and-Mitigation-Strategies-New-Zealand-TPM-1.pdf
        
        Search the document for references to Ferguson. 7 times, every time to highlight how their model concurs with his.
        
        Here is a review of the Ferguson model.
        
        “The model. What it’s doing is best described as “SimCity without the graphics””
        
        https://dailysceptic.org/code-review-of-fergusons-model/
        
        This is the second review, even more damning than the first.
        
        https://dailysceptic.org/second-analysis-of-fergusons-model/
        
        It was a shit show from the beginning and Hendy and co basically piggy backed off of it to get money from a gullible Labour government.
        
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        February 5, 2022 11:29am
      - Master Mariner
        
        @CM
        This is what popped out.
        “after having been upgraded for over a month by a team from Microsoft and others.”
        This concurs with Hendy/Microsoft collaboration of the NZ Model.
        “All government agencies were thirsty for information and they were using the static model outputs from Te Punaha Matatini at the University of Auckland as the basis for scenario planning. They needed to run their own scenarios to fit their specific circumstances, but they needed to be done on a single model that didn’t vary from the work being done by the University of Auckland team, led by Professor Shaun Hendy,” Leon explains.”
        
        https://news.microsoft.com/en-nz/2021/02/17/catching-covid-19-the-digital-mapmakers-that-helped-drive-new-zealands-successful-virus-response/
        
        And,
        
        “Using Microsoft’s Azure cloud, web app Blazor and artificial intelligence technology, Stephen took Te Punaha Matatini’s Susceptible, Infected, Recovered (SIR) pandemic equations and developed a dynamic model that gave all of the logisticians and planners access to undertake their own “what-if” scenario models.”
        
        So, I guess the question should be , What are the “What if’s” ? Obviouslt the “What if’s” are what was used to reinforce their own Covid numbers?
        
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        February 5, 2022 12:26pm
    - ClanMcleod
      
      cmm I have posted this before, if you haven’t checked it out I highly recommend you do so. Based on your comments you will enjoy the read. Insightful and to the point.
      
      “Even if by some miracle all of this winds down tomorrow, this whole odious internationally networked enterprise of Virus Astrology, from virologers to sequencers to testers to planners to nudgers to vaccinators, won’t go away.”
      
      Think Baker, Wiles, Hendy, Jackson, Petoussis Harris etc etc etc.
      A cancer that will need to be cut out.
      
      https://www.eugyppius.com/p/the-pandemicists-must-be-stopped
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:16am
  - I remember when
    
    Using the Australian experience it would be reasonable to expect us to peak at 30,000 daily cases.
    The peak is more likely to occur at the end of February, or early in March. About the time MIQ changes happen.
    Denmark does suggest a possible 50,000 but they are in the depths of winter.
    
    This is based on looking at actual figures so may vary from those produced by models.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:26am
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      We will get the Omicron BA2 variant that will produce a higher peak and shorter wave. It will be closer to 200,000 cases a day as wave takes about a month and almost everyone in NZ (5 million) will get it.
      
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      February 5, 2022 12:08pm
      - Ra Henare
        
        Bollocks to 200,000 and almost everyone in NZ will get it.
        
        have dropped your comment in the fearporn basket.
        
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        February 5, 2022 4:09pm
      - UrbanNeocolonialist
        
        What are you afraid of? It’s basically an irrelevancy to your life unless you are near death anyway, but we are all going to get it in next 2-3 months. R0 of BA.2 variant of omicron is somewhere up around 10, which means 1-1/R0 = 90% (basically everyone in the country) will get it before herd immunity is established. Vaccines don’t stop infections and spread, just reduce severity.
        
        BA2 is already dominant in many countries (eg denmark) leading to a new spike in cases, its rapidly outcompeting BA1 variant due to it’s higher infectivity. Because we have barely started with omicron it is more likely to become dominant here once it gets in (and it will).
        
        But just because we will likely (invisibly) exceed >200k per day that doesn’t mean that we need be concerned – its mild and cold like or asymptomatic in almost everyone outside a tiny fraction of sick people, In a normal household of 4 or 5 people a couple generally won’t even notice they’ve had it, and from Australian data the hospitalisation rate is so low that even our pathetically mismanaged health system can easily manage and it looks like it will only about a weeks worth of NZ’s natural death rate, Ie unnoticeable in annual statistics.
        
        We are all at vastly more risk of death from cancer, heart issues, stroke etc in the next year.
        
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        February 5, 2022 11:00pm
    - Stu2
      
      I think we will peak lower than that, for a couple of reasons:
      
      – we have higher booster levels than Oz did when their outbreaks kicked off
      – their outbreaks were partly fueled by Chrismas and New Years social and family events. We got very few cases from those (and they were Delta)
      
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      February 5, 2022 1:38pm
      - ClanMcleod
        
        Vaccination drives Omicron cases, it doesn’t stop or slow it.
        
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        February 6, 2022 5:27am
    - Jim
      
      Good work, I’ll endorse that. For 10% I’ll ask Hipkins for the $6M fee on your behalf.
      
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      February 5, 2022 5:58pm
- JibberJabber
  
  Hipkins can smell Vanilla in the air and this is the beginning of his run against the Red Queen, somehow I doubt this weedy milquetoast will be successful.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:01am
- Jim
  
  Hipkins’ interview with Hosking was only bettered (for pure embarrassment) by ex-HRH Randy (too honourable) Andy.
  More seriously though Hipkins demonstrated a disgraceful dereliction of duty and is clearly responsible for the disproportionate economic and social impact of his policies so [to] save a few lives (let’s not lose sight of the ridiculous covid death definition).
  
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  February 5, 2022 5:52pm
Weetbix3ways

Yet another study showing the continuing efficacy of Vitamin-D to prevent serious CV symptoms: https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-study-offers-strongest-proof-yet-of-vitamin-ds-power-to-fight-covid/
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February 5, 2022 9:16am
- cmm
  
  There is absolutely nothing controversial in this. The role of Vit D in the immune system has been identified and acknowledged for at least 50 years.
  
  When the first CV19 wave knocked over a lot of dark skinned doctors in UK, they started giving them all Vit D and, surprise, surprise, that stopped.
  
  Vit D deficiency is linked to all sorts of problems from colon cancer to mental health.
  
  Yet I doubt the Podium of Truth has mentioned Vit D even once. Can’t have people taking control of their own lives.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:09am
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    A bit of sunlight helps, but then the cancer wanks start their nonsense. Put your hat and mask on, cover up…….
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:22am
    - Steve Otto(North Shore)
      
      Add. Bit different for me. I am one of those pale whities that rarely burns
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:23am
    - mawm
      
      Sunscreen blocks UVB which is necessary for making Vit D.
      
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      February 5, 2022 1:00pm
      - Steve Otto(North Shore)
        
        I don’t wear it. Even in Alaska gold panning our hosts said I must wear sunblock. I just told them I’m from NZ and we have a hole in the ozone layer.
        Alaskan summer is just like Auckland summer
        
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        February 5, 2022 1:53pm
  - Sacha
    
    I expect that they took other immune boosters as well, such as zinc.
    From my reading, Vitamin D3 is stored by fat cells, and does not do its job without the support of other elements. And it takes time to build up to protective levels
    I have also read that although NZ has many long hours of sunshine, and some people do get outside enough to really benefit, generally speaking most Kiwis have a low Vit D3 level when it comes to peak immune system function. Coupled with a low Zinc level, it means that many become much sicker than they should.
    This is where the MoH/Government has failed the NZ people. It failed to educate them about basic health matters, preferring to rely on a chemical injection of doubtful benefit.
    A Caring Government indeed!
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:26am
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      Most people spend only a few minutes a day outside in the sun, and most are covered head to foot in clothing even when they do. Your Vit D production also drops way off with age and obesity.
      
      I’ve noticed a substantial improvement in my general health since I went on it 18months back.
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:54am
    - mawm
      
      The banning of any repurposed drugs to treat Covid early was their biggest crime – all to keep on stuffing the pockets of those profiting from vaccines and advancing the narrative of a deadly disease that required isolation and the resetting of society, and done without a whim of compassion for the people they represent.
      
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      February 5, 2022 1:05pm
    - Observer of Life
      
      I tried to get a household lot of Vit D from my Dr last week. No, apparently can only give out 6 at a time!!!!
      
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      February 5, 2022 5:10pm
Lee C

Police in New Plymouth have accepted a complaint against Andrew Little the Health Minister for culpable manslaughter and will arrest him. If they do not do this in a timely manner a citizens arrest will be done as is allowed under the crimes act of New Zealand. The case number is 220203/2237 if you have evidence of injury or death you can now complain and add your evidence to this police complaint using this number. They are now marching to the media in New Plymouth as they are complicit in this crime. There will be more and others will be added to this. This is happening in New Plymouth now and live streaming on Telegram. You will hear nothing of this on MSM
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February 5, 2022 9:23am
- Nickc2
  
  Evidence/link please!
  
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  February 5, 2022 9:45am
- cmm
  
  Got any details on the complaint?
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:09am
  - kevn
    
    @cmm…. Must be jab related injury/death.
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:18am
  - greybeard
    
    https://www.stuff.co.nz/taranaki-daily-news/news/127686420/protestors-march-on-new-plymouth-police-station-demand-health-minister-andrew-littles-arrest
    
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    February 5, 2022 10:51am
  - Gravelroad
    
    Could be a scam.
    Friend showed me message yesterday which claimed a guy he knew (committed anti-vaxxer) was going to be arrested shortly for manslaughter due to his anti Covid vaccination stance.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:08am
    - bronny1
      
      How do this so called anti vaxxer directly or indirectly kill anyone? We’ve hardly had any covid deaths in nz that didn’t have multiple comorbidities.
      
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      February 5, 2022 5:43pm
NeverMindTheBollocks

It’s extraordinary how white the Winter Olympics are, without a single peep from the usual complainants.
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February 5, 2022 9:23am
- Biscuit
  
  That Jamaican Bobsled team seemed to have a few, how shall we put it, men of colour in it.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:55am
  - NeverMindTheBollocks
    
    The exception that proves the rule
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:06am
curry4me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elEOtg8dNT0

Truck convoy leaders hold news conference in Ottawa – February 3, 2022.

The leaders of ‘Freedom Convoy 2022’, a group of truck drivers and their supporters occupying downtown Ottawa, hold a news conference to address various issues surrounding their ongoing protest. The demonstration against COVID-19 vaccine mandates and restrictions has gripped the city since it began on January 28 on Parliament Hill. [15:54. Non biased One Ewes version coming in 5,4,3,2,1. /sarc]
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February 5, 2022 9:31am
curry4me

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

Pauline Hanson’s Please Explain, Episode 13 “Please Explain The Great Australian Dream”.

With housing prices soaring the great Australian dream of owning your own home is becoming more and more difficult for many everyday Aussies. This week we find out one of the reasons why. [2:23]
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February 5, 2022 9:31am
lazza

Quote; (GD 4 Feb) …

“Omicron will have torn through the population long before the borders open. The same crowd that brought us climate warming is at work here in pushing Omicron controls “.

Really?

Sure, the two issues “may be” attracting the usual congenital deniers (Government control of “anything” is their anathema) … but to conflate the two cases denies analysing the merits separately of each case.

Bloody dumb! ehh?
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February 5, 2022 9:40am
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  I don’t think its bloody dumb.
  
  There’s been mismanagement of both issues for political ends.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:36am
- rouppe
  
  Not really. The modeling for both has been a complete failure, and in both examples enormous change and strain is being put on the ordinary person using those models as a basis.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:37am
- ClanMcleod
  
  Well the one thing we can be absolutely sure of is that the government can’t control a virus and they can’t control the climate. On both counts, they think they can. On both counts they are delusional fuckwits.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:36am
- alloytoo
  
  oh full marks for using the denier label.
  
  Here’s the reality:
  
  Omicron is an airborn virus, more contagious than Delta by about 70%.
  It’s also about 20% of the severity of Delta.
  Vaccine is ineffective on reducing the spread.
  
  Vaccine passports have no clinical value.
  
  The models, done by many of the same modeller as climate change are being cherry picked for maximum fear porn.
  
  Government response is to continue ineffective travel and social restrictions, torture school children (and everyone else) with useless face masks in the height of summer and encourage contact tracing.
  
  The incubation period of omicron is 2.5 -3 days, the PM, arguably the most important public official in the land was informed 7 days (Twice the incubation period) after her potential exposure to Omicron.
  
  The solution at this juncture is to accept that Omicron is no worse than the flu, take sensible measures to protect the most vulnerable and drop all Covid restrictions and use Omicron to generate herd immunity.
  
  Likewise climate change models and predictions are being cherry picked for maximum fear porn.
  
  The most accurate climate model is the Russian model which doesn’t use CO2 as it’s primary driver.
  
  Assuming that there is a man made component to climate change (apart from the obvious local ones) and assuming that CO2 is that primary driver then what is the solution?
  
  CO2 intensive production of Wind turbines and Solar panels, both with a high land usage and short operation lifetime.
  
  The practical, safe, proven Nuclear solution is being ignored.
  
  Bloody dumb! ehh?
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:55am
Rusty

Next month will mark 2 years since Nzers have had to endure socialists/marxist doctrine disguised as health and safety measures due to a overblown flu virus strain.

And the sad thing about it all, most Nzers don’t care or think it is a good idea.
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February 5, 2022 9:57am
Clogs

I don’t know what to do.

I am double jabbed, as I am in a mandated industry. I love my job. I still have 15-20 years in my industry and still so much I want to achieve. The last couple of years have been bloody hard work to lift my place of work from dire to thriving. To leave would mean momentum would evaporate and I’d be completely heartbroken.

However, I see the Covid narrative starting to fall apart in NZ (and across the world). I don’t want to get the booster, but have to. And I am so angry about this. I’ve done everything I need to do so far, but why is my job on the line for something that has little to no affect on the current variation of the virus?

Is there anyone else in this situation?
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February 5, 2022 10:08am
- Nukuleka
  
  Yes, as a part time contracted teacher I am compelled to get the booster. No 3rd jab no job. I will hold out till the last day before succumbing to the mandate.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:48am
  - UrbanNeocolonialist
    
    This is causing enormous stress in the public sector, and they are losing a substantial number of essential staff (that they can’t replace) because of it – leaving them short handed in front line roles. I don’t think Govt will be able to hold to this line much longer, because everyone with a brain knows it is stupid and is going to be ended in a matter of weeks to months as Omicron sweeps through. Those being threatened don’t need to acquiesce, they know they will get their way soon.
    
    And large numbers of younger healthy people are well founded in not seeing a compelling case for taking a poorly targeted booster for the miniscule threat of omicron.
    
    In no sane world can endless 3 monthly boosters be a viable plan going forward.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:37am
  - Rodion Raskolnikov
    
    “I will hold out till the last day before succumbing to the mandate.”
    
    You have to be fully prepared to lose your job. It is that simple (I hope you don’t lose it, but if you aren’t prepared to, then you may as well get boosted now). This is serious, so a serious attitude must be adopted.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:02pm
- Joely Doe
  
  Is there anyone else in this situation?
  
  Yep, many of us are.
  All Health Professionals are mandated to have the Booster (you know, the Third Shot of the stuff that works so well the first two times) by 15th Feb or within 4 months of the last shot.
  Happy to wait for the Omicron specific shot but don’t have that option.
  Actually, I am happy to ride out the Omicron wave on the first two shots I have already had – but I don’t get that choice.
  Remember the Science – the first two shots are all you need to defeat Covid.
  Well actually you need a third shot – after 6 months.
  Huh? Really? It doesn’t work, you say? Make it 4 months then.
  Shit, still not working, better make it 3 months, that’s the magic.
  What do you mean Medsafe still hasn’t updated the Safety Data Sheet?
  Didn’t they get the memo from the Comms Team?!
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:49am
  - marcw
    
    A bonanza for the news media – first a round of advertising for the ‘booster’, then another advertising round to change the timing to 4 months, now another round of taxpayer funded advertising to change to the ‘new’ 3 months timing. Soon to come – another round of advertising for the new recipe Omicron treatment. Meanwhile, waiting lists for life saving treatments get longer.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:05am
    - Jim
      
      No scientific basis, just BS political bum pluck. Where are the unions?
      
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      February 5, 2022 6:56pm
- H. Upmann
  
  “Is there anyone else in this situation?”
  Yes. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions.
  
  Worldwide – hundreds of millions.
  
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  February 5, 2022 10:50am
  - Jim
    
    Hence Ottawa is so important
    
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    February 5, 2022 6:57pm
- NeverMindTheBollocks
  
  You have my sympathy. Not medical advice, but you could consider postponing the booster until the last possible moment. The situation is fluid; Jacinda may change her mind at any time.
  
  Incidentally, calling it the booster is straight from marketing. It’s a third shot of vaccine & its proponents should be honest enough to call it thus.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:11am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  “not only will there be no forced vaccinations, but those who choose to opt-out won’t face any penalties at all.”
  https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2020/09/coronavirus-jacinda-ardern-confident-enough-kiwis-will-get-covid-19-vaccine-for-herd-immunity-without-being-forced-to.html
  There you have it – the ultimate LIE
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:32am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  Suggestion: go and catch omicron ASAP (should be possible to find plenty of infected people in a week or two). Makes the booster pointless (science backs this), and you can stay off sick for a few weeks until they inevitably cave on the issue.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:41am
  - DeepBlue
    
    At least become a close contact. That will buy 10 more days. And if your family has it, 24.
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:46pm
- ClanMcleod
  
  I know it’s easier said than done, but the sooner enough people refuse to comply, the sooner this comes to an end. It is hard, it may seem impossible, but while people keep complying with ridiculous mandates and rules this will keep going.
  You are seeing the narrative collapse because more people are refusing to comply and asking hard questions.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:42am
  - Rodion Raskolnikov
    
    Exactly. Just as the system of control was quickly established by the means of mass communication, it commensurably will fall apart in the same manner. Because the Covid tyranny is by necessity an orchestrated unity of actions and purpose, as the elements start to crumble (i.e. the policies in individual jurisdictions) the whole thing will lose all structural integrity and collapse in on itself. It’s just a matter of patience and waiting it out. Even in just the last couple of months, the narrative has been shattered in the eyes of more and more people. Events like the Canadian convoy are the signs that the game is up and cannot continue.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:59pm
  - mawm
    
    Become ungovernable!
    
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    February 5, 2022 1:14pm
    - bronny1
      
      Yup. Went grocery shopping without a mask today. I’m young and fit, the sort of person unlikely to have a medical exemption. It felt good even as it felt subversive (sadly).
      Try small acts of non compliance!
      
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      February 5, 2022 6:03pm
- Rich Prick
  
  When the first two medical interventions haven’t worked as described, you must be at least a little sceptical of the third, fourth or twentieth. The narrative is falling apart, you can tell by the government advertising spend.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:20pm
- Rodion Raskolnikov
  
  Have you ever had to make a sacrifice for a much larger principle? Most of us haven’t until now. Essentially, every time someone falls into line due again due to not being strong enough, the harder it will be for everyone to get out. The implications of going along with what you know to be a set of demonstrable falsehoods, just for some perceived short term advantage, are severe, and are unprecedented in any of our lifetimes. You will have to say “no” at some time, so it may as well be now. Don’t think you can avoid some disadvantage. The “weak men make hard times, hard times make strong men … etc.” maxim is often cited, but actually backing up the idea with action is another matter.
  
  I lost my job last year due to exercising my rights to bodily autonomy. For upholding my rights, I have been made a second class citizen in my own country. But I know that I am right, and by each passing day, I feel vindicated . It is just a waiting game: I fully expect that the narrative is unsustainable on the basis that it bears no relationship to the truth. It is a one-way trajectory, with growing dissent and lessening acceptance of the government’s credibility. The dominoes are already falling elsewhere and New Zealand will follow suit. The main variable is how stubborn Ardern is.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:52pm
- Hollyfield
  
  Like Nukuleka if the booster is mandated in my industry I will wait until the last possible day to take it.
  
  What’s really stupid is that in my company 3 backroom functions totalling 15 people do not fit into the main premises, so we are located in another building (another suburb even!) to anyone who is public facing. We are of no risk to the people we are supposed to be protecting, because we never see them, and do not even see the staff who do see them. However we share an office with around 6 companies who are not mandated to be vaccinated. So we have to be vaccinated to protect people we never see, while mixing in the same room with people who are unvaccinated.
  
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  February 5, 2022 1:15pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    Isn’t Labour Logic fascinating? You need to be very clever to think this shit up//
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:02pm
- DeepBlue
  
  Can you spend your next week at work before the mandate kicks in, planing a programme for your return when the mandates come off?
  
  Give the plan to your boss and ask if he has some budget to contract you to develop the plan in your mandated down time.
  
  If you have a passion for your job you will have great ideas that will mean you can continue on somewhere at Post Mandate. In the meantime work out your minimum budget, take other work, and continue your professional development to keep moving forward.
  
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  February 5, 2022 1:51pm
- Observer of Life
  
  Clogs: Yep my partner too. Apparently Medsafe has just provisionally approved Novovax for use. Should be available in March. Can you take leave until it’s available?
  
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  February 5, 2022 5:21pm
- bronny1
  
  Get legal advivpce as to how to hold out until the mandates are wiped.
  
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  February 5, 2022 5:59pm
bythesea

little 1 minute comedy skit mocking the woke
https://twitter.com/UnleashedComedy/status/1489645490866171907

great punch line
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February 5, 2022 10:08am
Maggy Wassilieff

Are we in a partnership with Maori?

Are they NOT us?

https://pointofordernz.wordpress.com/2022/02/04/democracy-or-partnership-a-critical-issue-revisited/#more-14246
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February 5, 2022 10:12am
blue collar

Not sure if it’s vaccine injury ( my bloody arm still sore ) or if it also includes failure to get adequate hospital care ie ; scans , cancer diagnosis , heart stuff etc due to their policy of deferring everything and keeping room for a covid wave that never happened .
Let alone failure to increase icu .
Let alone the fact hospitals maxed out prior to covid ( public in hallways as run out of beds I remember the articles )
If so he is toast .
I know for a fact my sister works in a large hospital in Auckland and they had almost 20 icu beds , empty for a period in 2020 doing about 3 surgeries a week and normally 100% .
Doctors twiddling their thumbs awaiting the mighty influx under govt orders .
Has it changed ?
So who missed out ?
How long to clear a back log ?
Nice to see some accountability, Brenda will bury it somehow .
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February 5, 2022 10:12am
Bridgenag

Sorry………. Computer nitwit here. How can I look at this?
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February 5, 2022 10:21am
- Bridgenag
  
  This was a reply to Lee C …… 36 comments back…….
  
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  February 5, 2022 4:55pm
Alan Wilkinson

UK jury acquits farmer who dealt to a yobbo that parked on his land and then really pissed him off. The video is hilarious.

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/17547810/farmer-flipped-car-forklift-cleared/
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February 5, 2022 10:30am
- All_on_Red
  
  He was smart asking for Trial by Jury
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:01am
  - marcw
    
    Staggering – a FOUR day trial. A new definition of insanity.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:15am
    - Alan Wilkinson
      
      First time I’ve ever wanted to be on a jury.
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:42am
oldfella

Yesterday, I checked out the Daily Blog and saw a brand new, jaw-dropping article by Chris Trotter on the dangers of the whole co-governance issue.
I went looking for it again today, with a view to posting it here, but it seems to have vanished.
Are my oldfella eyes failing me?
Can anyone else spot it on the DB site? Went looking on Trotter’s own Bowalley Rd and can’t find it there, either. Hmm.
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February 5, 2022 10:45am
- UrbanNeocolonialist
  
  So who threatened to cancel him?
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:28am
- Gerrit
  
  You having a blokey look?
  Try here
  
  https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2022/02/04/something-entirely-different-why-co-governance-is-a-very-bad-idea/
  
  Layout on the TDB is not chronological so you have to scroll around a bit. Under “Setting the Agenda”.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:44am
  - oldfella
    
    Cheers, Gerrit for finding it. Yep, must have been a ‘blokey look’ on my part. Guilty as charged. (Should have asked Mrs Oldfella to find it for me.)
    BTW, have just reread what Trotter wrote.
    https://thedailyblog.co.nz/2022/02/04/something-entirely-different-why-co-governance-is-a-very-bad-idea/
    Any article by a doyen of the left, with a headline WHY CO-GOVERNANCE IS A VERY BAD IDEA is a must read.
    
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    February 5, 2022 12:17pm
Alan Wilkinson

Yet more evidence that lockdowns failed to produce benefits claimed by epidemiologists’ models that failed to consider voluntary public behaviour responses that prove ten times more effective than mandated ones.

https://www.city-journal.org/new-study-finds-covid-lockdowns-had-no-benefit
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February 5, 2022 10:48am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  These so called modelers are full of shit.
  First they are given a target, goal, desired result – call it whatever.
  Then they cherrypick selective data, fudge, bend, manipulate, fudge it to produce the wanted result.
  AND they get paid handsomely for doing so – by the Net Taxpayer
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:42am
I remember when

West Coast Messenger: Art on the Beach:
The 20th edition of the Driftwood and Sand Festival drew budding artists to Hokitika beach for four days of workshops, brilliant sunshine and wonderful creasting.
About 50 sculptures used sea glass, shells, stones, and sand to bring life to an array of driftwood.
Creations ranged from a giant stick insect and sharks, to a Loch Ness monster, a moving ferris wheel and Vincent van Gogh’s sunflowers.

Opportunity comes in so many forms.
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February 5, 2022 10:50am
Maggy Wassilieff

Q. What happens if your MIQ spot is in Rotorua?

A. You get to share a room with loads of lake flies

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2022/02/woman-stuck-in-miq-room-with-hundreds-of-bugs.html
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February 5, 2022 10:53am
Maggy Wassilieff

Is the real reason Labour has kept the screws on folks returning to NZ is so that some favoured Hotels/motels and union members could keep the $$$$$ flowing in?

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/460916/miq-workers-fear-wage-cuts-as-facilities-set-to-return-to-hotels
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February 5, 2022 10:58am
- PeeJay
  
  If we had any real investigative journalists (maybe Morah?) they’d do well to remember the famous line from Watergate. Follow the money. Some firms, like selected hotels have done very well out of MIQ. Would be very interesting to investigate if there are any connections or donations involved.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:38pm
I remember when

Is there no end to the addition of ‘bars’ to secondary student’s blazers.
An advertisement for Nga Tawa Diocesan School features two students.
One of the girls has a total of 24 ‘bars’ and then another 7 ‘buttons.’
The other, obviously an under achiever, wasn’t far behind.

I wonder how many parents say, “That looks great we must send our daughter there.”
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February 5, 2022 10:59am
- Alan Wilkinson
  
  Our classmates won five national university scholarships, a Rhodes scholarship and eventually an Olympic gold medal. None of us had any bars on our blazers. Imagine what we could have achieved if we had?
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:38am
Lee C

ARguments against jabbing little people – from actual doctors. https://nzdsos.com/2022/01/06/reasons-for-not-injecting-children/?fbclid=IwAR3plvaNdOs9pLtbB2iYZ0bgoweZOheaLrL7EDU8y5OXgfBWOisw9T9rz0U
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February 5, 2022 11:02am
- alloytoo
  
  January study in the UK indicated that Omicron didn’t care whether under 17 year olds were jabbed or not.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:26am
Tasman devil

The hospitality industry is largely collapsing and so the Prime Muppet as an act of kindness requires overseas arrivals from October to self isolate for 7 days.

What you’d expect from a Cabinet with only two
Ministers who have run a business.
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February 5, 2022 11:03am
- Bob
  
  only two
  Ministers who have run a business……..
  and neither of the businesses were a success.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:59am
artemisia

The list of weak, incompetent Ministers is getting longer. I expect they are aware their decisions and utterances are being saved up for when the time is right.

There will be more short vids in the green room like the Poto / Campbell one.
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February 5, 2022 11:10am
Maggie Pie

It’s never been sooo sticky!

Just driving back home from tennis, moon-roof wide open, hear Jack Tame saying….”He never has much luck with women”.
Nek minit, he starts speaking in Te Reo!
LOL!!

Honestly, I felt like txting him that he might be better off following me here on KB if he’s looking for relationship advice.
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February 5, 2022 11:18am
- Alan Wilkinson
  
  I’m guessing women never had much luck with him, Maggie.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:29am
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Think you’re right there, Al.
    I can just imagine my own mum & dads reaction if I’d been going out with a guy who spoke Maori.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:57am
- Gravelroad
  
  What woman would be bothered with him when he is already besotted and love sick over St Jacinda?
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:57am
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  Clever Women I guess
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:15pm
- Inandout
  
  Maggie, he used to share a flat with a blond reporter who just went off and married another chap. Such is life.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:17pm
- MCōs
  
  I’m guessing his wife is quite happy the way things are.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:50pm
Yvette

Live – Will it be a record-high COVID day? Latest update incoming as Kiwis travel for Waitangi weekend
With 209 new cases recorded on Friday and a steady trend upwards in recent days, it’s possible New Zealand could see its highest daily total this weekend.
The current record is 222, hit back in November as Delta continued to storm across Auckland and other parts of the country.
All eyes will be on the 1pm update from the Ministry of Health – which Newshub will bring you as soon as it is released – to see if that record has been broken.
– Newshub

Live – Will the 1pm Announcement actually be at 1pm today?
I don’t have exact records to refer to, but fucked if I can ever remember it being at 1pm.
So will it continue to be an indication of Government incompetence and more non-delivery while public has been key-up to expect a devastating omicron outbreak, boosted by Ardern’s every comment? – a life or death frustration to know if the other shoe has dropped … yet … again … or yet again?
– just bloody ol’ Yvette
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February 5, 2022 11:22am
- septic skeptic
  
  This “1 pm” update does indicate a staggering level of incompetence and/or arrogance from the MOH. If I was tasked with producing the update, I would have it out at 1 pm on the dot, barring exceptional circumstance. If for some reason that was not possible on a regular basis – I would run a 1.30 or 2 pm daily update and be prompt with that instead.
  
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  February 5, 2022 11:33am
  - UrbanNeocolonialist
    
    I wouldn’t give anyone in Cindys team a job. If they can’t work to a (self imposed) deadline, and make a point of not wasting other’s time then they have attitudes that make them unsuitable for responsible positions.
    
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    February 5, 2022 11:47am
- Tony Stuart
  
  Up on Stuff at 1.18pm, and it is indeed a record; 243 new community cases:
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/300511436/covid19-243-new-cases-in-the-community-10-people-in-hospital
  
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  February 5, 2022 1:19pm
  - Bob
    
    243 cases is a long way short of the government modellers prediction of 6 -8000 by Waitangi Day.
    govt better get a move on with the infection rate in order to justify the pending lockdown.
    We are due for one!
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:04pm
    - UrbanNeocolonialist
      
      243 cases officially, but a tonne of people who won’t be bothering to get tested, or won’t even know they’ve got it. Real number is likely several times higher.
      
      Australia doubled every 4-5 days, and took about 6 weeks from 50 per million where we are till their measured peak (a tiny fraction of real number), but maybe faster spread in NZ with schools open.
      
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      February 5, 2022 11:15pm
  - Rich Prick
    
    It seems we are about to go exponential. Has two years of financial and personal pain been worth it?
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:08pm
    - NeverMindTheBollocks
      
      Rhetorical question
      
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      February 5, 2022 6:08pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    34.8% boosted, 94.4% double vaccinated.
    Here is me thinking vaccination stop most from getting a disease. Someone is not telling me the truth.
    Jaspinda and Chippie – explain yourselves now
    
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    February 5, 2022 2:24pm
  - NK
    
    Only 49,548 to go by Monday:
    
    https://nominister.wordpress.com/2022/02/05/only-49791-to-go/
    
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    February 5, 2022 4:21pm
Sir Cullen's Sidekick

Looks like Jaffas on City rail link route could be paying a $1000 “levy” to fund it. I love it for two reasons (a) Jaffas deserve it for voting for this corrupt gummit (b) Labour punishing its own vote base.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/aucklands-working-class-could-cop-1000-light-rail-tax-being-considered-by-government/ZPTQBA2YANQQLWA7TZ5BTZBXYY/
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February 5, 2022 11:50am
- PeeJay
  
  One of the reasons I detest tribal loyalty in politics is things like this. Labour don’t look out for the poor – they expand the number of poor to ensure their voting base. If you get captured by the state support net, then you are more likely to vote for the party that gives you ‘free stuff’. All the while their living conditions and wages decrease because of the government, therefore needing more ‘free stuff’ from the government. Classic substance dependency when you think about it. Doubtful most of the sheep have ever read a manifesto in their lives.
  
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  February 5, 2022 12:46pm
  - Maggy Wassilieff
    
    My theory is that Labour was all for supporting folks at the bottom of the heap until those bottom-dwellers started moving up into middle-class land and performed better at jobs and in education than the lazy & spoilt Labour offspring.
    
    So then Labour put the clamps on easy access to good schools and free education and apprentice-ships for slum dwellers.
    
    7 1
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    February 5, 2022 3:23pm
kevn

@septic… ‘They’ just need to get poto williams to front. Say nothing but just stand there pretending.
8 0
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February 5, 2022 11:51am
Maggie Pie

And remember when the conspiracy theorists said the plan was to put everyone in debt.
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February 5, 2022 11:51am
Sir Cullen's Sidekick

BTW – This was front page in NZHerald online when I read it…Now it has disappeared to some other section. May be a good share of journalism fund was promised?
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February 5, 2022 11:52am
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Taxpayer’s Union. $32K for a bus stop on an island with no public transport. AT are defending the spend.
How can we get rid of these idiots?
https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=313797324127538&set=a.312629070911030
26 1
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February 5, 2022 12:14pm
- Rich Prick
  
  Auckland Transport are amateurs compared to these muppets.
  
  https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/97376462/council-defends-hole-in-bus-shelter-logic
  
  18 0
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  February 5, 2022 12:44pm
  - Alan Wilkinson
    
    How much did their hole in the roof cost?
    
    14 0
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    February 5, 2022 1:00pm
    - Rich Prick
      
      $300k apparently, those optional extras can ramp up the sticker price.
      
      10 0
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      February 5, 2022 2:04pm
    - Jim
      
      The architect should look up the definition of ‘shelter’ ?
      
      0 0
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      February 6, 2022 2:08pm
  - PeeJay
    
    These are examples of when you drive out independent thinkers from local government (and central) and replace them with nodding bobble heads. In times past, someone on the project would have said, hang on a second, $300k for a f-ing bus shelter and you want to put a hole in it? The project would have been canned and a please explain would have been required from the team and consultant proposing this shit. Nowadays, everyone nods along and the PR shit spinning machine launches into overdrive!
    
    19 0
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    February 5, 2022 1:07pm
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Same crowd that spent 40k of ratepayer’s money on ‘KIWIFIST’ in 2018.
    
    Learned nothing by the sound of it.
    
    18 1
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    February 5, 2022 1:35pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    Unbelievably stupid. When will the adults be in charge again?
    
    11 1
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    February 5, 2022 2:28pm
    - Master Mariner
      
      Dear Eliza has a hole in her bucket.
      Unfortunately there are no “Henry’s” left.
      
      0 0
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      February 5, 2022 3:00pm
- Sir Cullen's Sidekick
  
  Unfortunately Mr Otto from North Shore, you need to wait until 2035 according to my political spies…
  
  2 1
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  February 5, 2022 6:56pm
Steve Otto(North Shore)

Democrat and Prius, what could go wrong?
Pelosi wants to nominate this woman for chairperson of transportation LOL.
https://rumble.com/vss89i-democrat-congresswoman-attempts-to-park-car.html?
14 1
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February 5, 2022 12:31pm
- Rich Prick
  
  That pretty much sums up Democrats, fuck everything up and wander off confused.
  
  15 1
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  February 5, 2022 12:40pm
emmess

Unbelievable

State Dept.: Russia is going to launch a false flag attack as a pretext to invade Ukraine.

Reporter: What’s your evidence?

State Dept.: I just gave it to you.

Reporter: No, you made an allegation.

State Dept.: Yes, that’s the evidence.

Reporter: ?

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/alex-jones-territory-watch-reporter-destroy-admin-spox-over-russian-false-flag-claims

I am starting to think this Ukraine/Russia situation is just a massive distraction and there are no concrete plans for an invasion.
15 1
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February 5, 2022 12:37pm
- MCōs
  
  Russia has already taken the Crimea plus sent troops into Ukraine eight years go.
  Depends who you listen to whether it was an invasion or not.
  Personally I wouldn’t trust anyone involved in that conflict, least of all Putin, and NZ is well off out of it.
  Having said that I can understand Russia no more wanting NATO breathing down its neck than America did the USSR sending nukes to Cuba.
  
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  February 5, 2022 1:18pm
  - marcw
    
    Please tell us which NATO country you feel is likely to want to invade Russia (or nuke it), and that Putin is in fear of?
    
    4 0
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    February 5, 2022 4:58pm
- ClanMcleod
  
  I watched that whole exchange between Lee and the State Dept. spox. It was unbelievable. I’m surprised it was allowed to go on as long as it did, in the former Soviet Union there would have been a gunshot and a black screen 5 seconds into the exchange.
  
  12 1
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  February 5, 2022 1:25pm
- Steve Otto(North Shore)
  
  That State Dept prick would do wonders for Jaspinda’s ratings LOL.
  Total word soup waffle
  
  9 1
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  February 5, 2022 2:38pm
CAKE FACE1

When this Covid fiasco started, I felt angry at the government policies.

CAKE was angry with the casual vandalism of the government. CAKE was furious about the sustained state paid propaganda used to justify the destruction of society and the economy. CAKE was aghast that support remained strong for the worst government in our history.

Finally, it is clear that the support for the government is collapsing. If Labour somehow contrive to win the next election, “Aotearoa” is finished as a place to live a comfortable, pleasant life. Hopefully, this won’t happen.

More likely, National / ACT will win the next election.

Nonetheless, I remain very concerned about the damage being done in the interim 18 months. What shape will the economy and society will National / ACT inherit in 18 months’ time?

I feel a sense of despair about the future for this country. Since 1989, former communist countries have had decades to recover from their previous communist system, but fixing society and the economy after a socialist shock takes decades of good policy.

Indeed, after Sir Robert Muldoon vandalised the country until 1984 (a blueprint that has been copied to the letter by Cindy), New Zealand had to suffer for decades to return to equilibrium. The people’s common decency has been despoiled in the last two years by Cindy, all in an orgy of vandalism and narcissism.

Higher inflation, higher interest rates, currency meltdown, mortgagee sales, mass business failures and mass poverty all seem likely to unfold over the next 18 months.

What will all this economic and social pain in the country be in aid of?

The socialist policies were introduced predominantly to treat Cindy’s white saviour affliction.

Cindy has burnt our economy to the ground, because of her emotional need to dress up in various outfits, and pretend to be the Messiah. Now we pay the cost of her mental failures.

Suffice to say, I no longer feel angry about this turn of events.

CAKE now feels a very deep sense of despair. The future looks grim, even if and when we throw these clowns out.

I still have nostalgia for the pre-Cindy times, but are these times gone forever, destroyed by a woke wasteland, that will stop anything good growing again?

Cindy is spiritually trying to sow the fields with salt, so nothing will ever grow again.

Is all hope gone?
28 1
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February 5, 2022 1:00pm
- DeepBlue
  
  No, hope is not gone, because you still have enough fight in you to write.
  
  7 0
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  February 5, 2022 1:58pm
- Taieri
  
  Indeed, after Sir Robert Muldoon vandalised the country until 1984 (a blueprint that has been copied to the letter by Cindy)
  ————
  
  A blueprint copied by “Cindy”? Not at all. While Muldoon left the country in hock, he also left us Tiwai Point, Methanex, Glenbrook, Clyde Dam, ammonia plant at Kapuni, expanded Marsden Point refinery, electrified NI trunk line and a few other things,
  “Cindy” so far managed to give us…hmmm, can’t really think of anything, apart from “kindness”, rainbow crossings and mangled English.
  
  11 0
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  February 5, 2022 3:02pm
  - Jim
    
    Don’t forget the useless bus shelters.
    
    0 0
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    February 6, 2022 2:11pm
ClanMcleod

Brilliant. This is regards Trudeau but equally applies to Ardern.

“there is a point where the rhetoric in a situation gets so out of step with the reality that it can only be called derangement.

trudeau has called these people racists, misogynists, white supremacists, and science deniers. he claims they are coming from a place of hate and do not represent canada.”

(Ardern says the same about those who oppose mandates and passports)

“the problem with speaking words like these in the days of endlessly accessible video is that, well, someone might record them and play them over video of what is really going on.

and then folks might share it on the internet for everyone to see.

the effect is absolutely devastating.”

https://www.tiktok.com/@quebec_rise_up/video/7060545595965984005?

Worth watching and worth reading the whole article.

https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/attempts-to-vilify-the-ottawa-protesters
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February 5, 2022 1:19pm
- kevn
  
  @Clan… TikTok hosts must love content like that.
  
  8 0
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  February 5, 2022 2:01pm
  - ClanMcleod
    
    @kevn it’s certainly more powerful than anything the msm can throw together!
    
    0 0
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    February 6, 2022 8:59am
greybeard

243 new “cases” today: where are the other 49,757 as promised?

https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018828230/covid-19-modelling-says-nz-could-face-50-000-infections-per-day-by-waitangi
8 0
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February 5, 2022 1:25pm
- info@cruzpro.com
  
  Still have a day to go so could happen.
  
  243 cases and only 19 new locations of interest. Either they all frequent the same establishments or contact tracing isn’t up to snuff.
  
  0 0
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  February 6, 2022 7:44am
Maggie Pie

Honestly, does anybody give a RAT’s about the Covid numbers any more?

https://twitter.com/1NewsNZ/status/1489754676648153096
19 2
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February 5, 2022 1:30pm
- Biscuit
  
  Maggie, I’m more concerned at your startling revelation that Jack Tame reckons he can’t attract females…
  
  I’ll lie awake for HOURS over that tonight…
  
  13 0
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  February 5, 2022 1:58pm
CAKE FACE1

“Combating child poverty has been a lifelong cause for Ardern and is the reason she entered politics aged 17.”

Combatting child poverty is a worthy cause, but when we want to implement practical solutions, it is important to do so in a rational and logical manner.

It seems to me that there are two approaches for addressing this issue.

One approach could be to see that there is a problem, and solve it like Jesus, by magically creating fish and bread for the poor. Cindy, I think, chose this option. She can click her fingers, like a latter-day Messiah, and magically the beneficiary households would be better off. This is actually an interesting insight into Cindy’s mental afflictions, that she has presumably spent her lifetime battling. She thought she would be loved by doing this. Alas, her policies actually make the situation worse.

Unfortunately, although the handouts worked for Jesus, for Cindy it wasn’t effective at all. The reason for the persistence of child poverty, despite extra handouts, is that child poverty isn’t exclusively an issue of low incomes. For example, many of these families have substance abuse issues (alcohol, meth or gambling predominantly). Many of these families have members suffering from mental health issues. These poor people often lack even basic education or training. Furthermore, Cindy delivered these unfortunate people a main course of the worst housing crisis in the world, followed up by dessert of food inflation that is amongst the highest in the world. She has made everything worse.

Alas, the strategies built on Cindy’s Messiah Complex have failed, because they were lazy policies, unconcerned with the scope and breadth that were required. A holistic package that dealt with all strands of the crisis were needed to be effective. Housing cost to mental health availability, with educative programmes concerning healthy eating, and budgeting advice, all would need to be implemented hand in hand, to have any meaningful results. Cindy could have invested in finding employment or apprenticeships for troubled and poor youth, but instead just paid higher handouts.

Cindy’s child poverty rationale for entering politics is interesting, because it showcases her laziness and incompetence categorically.

It is not good enough to simply desire good outcomes – you need to implement policies that will actually generate great results.

“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

Cindy, lead on…
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February 5, 2022 1:48pm
- Jim
  
  It’s a shame I can only give you one uptick ??
  
  6 0
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  February 5, 2022 7:24pm
Maggie Pie

The other thing I ment to mention…..topped up the car on my way to tennis this morning.
Two hundy goes f—ing nowhere anymore!
Supreme now @ $3.08 p/l
23 2
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February 5, 2022 1:52pm
- Biscuit
  
  Megan Woods in onto that, Maggie.
  
  She is looking into the increasing prices in everything – Supermarkets, Petrol…
  
  I am picking that when pies hit $10 each you may see some action!
  
  34 0
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  February 5, 2022 2:00pm
  - Nickc2
    
    Subtle as a brick!
    
    7 3
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    February 5, 2022 2:04pm
  - Maggie Pie
    
    😀 😀 😀
    
    18 1
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    February 5, 2022 2:05pm
  - Steve Otto(North Shore)
    
    $10 pies will not matter – she ain’t paying
    
    16 1
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    February 5, 2022 2:44pm
    - Steve Otto(North Shore)
      
      Always blow on the pie
      
      12 1
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      February 5, 2022 2:44pm
      - Maggie Pie
        
        That’s not silly either 😛
        
        13 1
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        February 5, 2022 2:51pm
- MCōs
  
  You’re making some oil company executives very rich.
  Not to mention taking some of the tax burden off the people who own electric cars.
  
  6 6
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  February 5, 2022 3:18pm
NK

Clear illustration of the abject failure of the “effective” Comirnaty Pfizer vaccine in Israel – one of the most vaccinated populations on the globe:

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/01/israel_a_profile_in_vaccine_failure_and_a_warning_to_the_world.html
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February 5, 2022 2:09pm
- Alan Wilkinson
  
  Not showing as a failure here:
  https://www.oecd.org/coronavirus/en/data-insights/excess-mortality-since-january-2020
  
  10 0
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  February 5, 2022 2:29pm
  - mikenmildagain
    
    That might simply be a good contrast in getting one’s info from the OECD rather than the ‘American Stinker’.
    
    1 8
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    February 5, 2022 4:18pm
    - Alan Wilkinson
      
      Dates matter. I didn’t find an excess death rate international comparison more recent than the OECD one which is only up to Nov 2021. The Israeli peak is since that.
      
      4 1
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      February 5, 2022 9:47pm
- MCōs
  
  26% of the population of Israel have had no shots at all, which means it’s not in the top 50 for vaccinations.
  On the other hand a high percentage of the population has had a booster shot.
  
  3 4
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  February 5, 2022 3:08pm
  - ClanMcleod
    
    Yes, that would explain why 80% of the most sick covid patients are triple jabbed. What a wonderful drug. The makes should be rewarded with great riches. Oh wait. They are.
    I’m sure you have a logical explanation for this MCōs.
    
    “Right now, most of our severe cases are vaccinated,” Jerris told Channel 13 News. “They had at least three injections. Between seventy and eighty percent of the serious cases are vaccinated. So, the vaccine has no significance regarding severe illness, which is why just 20% to 25% of our patients are unvaccinated.”
    
    https://dailysceptic.org/2022/02/05/80-of-serious-covid-cases-are-fully-vaccinated-israel-hospital-director/
    
    I look forward to your explanation with enthusiasm. Your clarity and logic is generally exemplerary.
    
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    February 6, 2022 9:40am
Reid

‘80% of serious COVID cases are fully vaccinated’ says Ichilov hospital director

Vaccine has “no significance regarding severe illness,” says Prof. Yaakov Jerris.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/321674
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February 5, 2022 2:46pm
Over Taxed Worker

Apologies if covered earlier – been away.
Horrid puff article on Jacinda in the NZH today.

Ardern said that call to isolate had come on what was supposed to be her wedding day.
“In fact, I got the phone call about 30 minutes before I was scheduled to walk down the aisle.”

Assuming this is the truth, then did they pay for all the costs that were incurred like the cake, catering, staff costs, etc.

The mystery guests have also been very quiet about being out of pocket.
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February 5, 2022 3:02pm
- kevn
  
  @OverTax… Nothing adds up does it?
  
  8 0
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  February 5, 2022 7:30pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Remember Ardern had already cancelled her wedding.
  
  She was due to get married on Saturday 29th at Young Nick’s Head Station, but she put all NZ into red Traffic Light on Sunday 23rd 11:59pm.
  
  It was at the TV Press Conference on Sunday 23rd that she told the Journos that her wedding was cancelled.
  
  8 0
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  February 5, 2022 9:11pm
- ClanMcleod
  
  Porkies. It’s what Brenda is best at.
  
  0 0
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  February 6, 2022 9:42am
bennerg

Free speech is under attack in the UK. The Times reports: “Trolls could be jailed for online threats”

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/trolls-could-be-jailed-for-online-threats-zp8ltnrfv

“people who deliberately share dangerous disinformation about fake Covid cures could soon face a prison sentence, the government has said.”

Well not so long ago people who advocated for Hydrochloroquine and Ivermectin as an effective treatment for Covid-19 were cast as sponsors of “fake news”. Now the real science is in we know they were correct.

So who is going to arbiter what is fake and what is not. We know that all the “Fact Checker” sites that suddenly popped up were themselves trolls “owned” by interested parties – ie big pharma.

So how long before the NZ authorities see this as a way to hang on to their precious “podium of truth” and damn all who disagree with them.

And when will the term “follow the science” be restored to a true rendition of the scientific method, rather than the “political science” sham we currently suffer under.
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February 5, 2022 3:32pm
- Jim
  
  The establishment of an Orwellian Ministry of Truth is surely an aspiration of corporatised globalist shills like a Ardern, Biden, Trudeau, Macron et al.
  
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  February 5, 2022 7:28pm
Maggie Pie

KID you not file……

‘Scottish PM Nicola Sturgeon has ordered all schools to cut the bottom off their doors in an attempt to fight Covid’

Says….. “this measure could improve ventilation at low cost”

– UK Independent
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February 5, 2022 3:50pm
- info@cruzpro.com
  
  Instead of cutting the bottom off doors how about leaving them ajar? It would work just as well and save time and money.
  
  7 0
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  February 5, 2022 7:36pm
  - marcw
    
    They are probably working on the principle taken up by our medical ‘experts’. The virus is only present in the air where you stand up in a restaurant – masks required. Sitting down, no mask required. That’s why only the air at the bottom of the doors is safe to circulate. Seems logical!
    
    10 1
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    February 5, 2022 8:23pm
    - Alan Wilkinson
      
      Bonkers isn’t it? Why does anyone take it seriously?
      
      7 1
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      February 5, 2022 9:39pm
      - ClanMcleod
        
        Because Brenda told them to and Brenda knows best. She’s the single source of truth. Get with the programme!
        
        0 0
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        February 6, 2022 9:50am
kevn

@Maggie… and hipkins orders hundreds of portable air filters for NZ schools. How much more to just install heat pumps (aka air filters) for the 4 seasons.
12 1
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February 5, 2022 4:01pm
Maggie Pie

Does Chinese President Xi Jinping harbor delusions of grandeur?

His opening remarks at the 2022 Winter Olympics…

“One World. One Family”

We’ve got news for him.
10 1
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February 5, 2022 5:39pm
- Maggy Wassilieff
  
  Well, I’m quite happy to join his whanau.
  https://finty.com/us/net-worth/xi-jinping/
  
  4 1
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  February 5, 2022 8:51pm
  - Maggie Pie
    
    Chicken-feed Maggs!
    
    Besides, who’d want to live on a diet of boiled rice and pangolin 🙁
    
    5 1
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    February 5, 2022 9:28pm
greybeard

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/cricket/300511502/former-black-caps-star-chris-cairns-diagnosed-with-bowel-cancer
This is very sad news but I have to ask: why is it that so-called celebrities and notable sports-people publish their personal problems on the web / social media ?
Do they have no sense of privacy, of any sort of personal and private life which does not have to be shared with the rest of the world?
Sorry, but whenever I read one of these articles I switch off. They seem to be no more than either an appeal for public approbation or for public funding.
7 3
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February 5, 2022 7:03pm
Swifty

Tom Sowell and Walter Williams get stuck into race hustlers. NZ gets a mention.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-Kotkt4DIz8

They nail the stuff about universities and academics only taking the soft subjects.
8 1
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February 5, 2022 8:10pm

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