At 3pm on Saturday Sunday, Andrew Little will be on The Standard for discussion with questions from our audience of ardent left-wingers, greens, those who are just interested, and the odd window driven troll. As always with candidates, this forum will be fully moderated. So…
I watched the NRL Grand Final last Sunday night at the Bristol in Cuba Street. I was going for the Rabbitohs and pleased to see them win. But I didn't like what I saw from Bulldog James Graham - two tackles led with his head…
Weekend social is for non political chat. What's on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no aggro, why can't we all just get along?
All the best to the ANZ staff who are on strike today: ANZ workers walk off the job ANZ Bank staff have today gone on strike across the country, with Wellington workers demanding the bank's $4.1 million boss David Hisco stop ''ratting'' on them. ...…
Today's Herald editorial raises important questions about the police search of Nicky Hager's home. In response to a complaint of theft - common old theft - five police officers spent the best part of a day searching the Hager home and taking away everything from…
Right now is an ideal time for the left to rethink our approach to social media and in this post I will outline a couple of examples showing why there has to be a better way. This week I did something that should give me automatic…
The Hager defence fund stands at over $41,000 $43,000 $44,000 and still climbing. But some mean-spirited wingnuts are trying to have it shut down, causing the host Spark / Givealittle organisation to post the following statement: Statement from Spark Foundation – Legal fund for Nicky…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the mike ...
"It all depends on the question you ask" - this was John Key's response to a question as to whether he had concerns about the SAS identifying air-strike targets that might kill civilians. If you ask whether they are comfortable with identifying targets people might…
In an interesting (but entirely predicable) turn of events the David Fisher at the Herald is reporting Police are reviewing a two-year-old criminal complaint against Whaleoil blogger Cameron Slater over material he used on his website. The review is studying how Slater obtained a vast quantity…
The usual tory cheerleaders have been quick to heap further bile on Hone Harawira: Harawira's recount bid backfires Mana leader Hone Harawira has failed in his bid to overturn the result in Te Tai Tokerau after an official recount delivered his opponents more votes. The…
Andrew Little has formally announced that he is also seeking the Labour Party leadership. From the Herald: Mr Little confirmed he would stand this morning after signalling he was thinking about it over the weekend. In a statement he said his background as the head…
Key clearly intends to play the terrorism card for all it's worth during this term: Key plans major speech on terror threat [Key] has signalled a shake-up of Security Intelligence Service laws after announcing a big break with tradition by relinquishing day-to-day oversight of the…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the mike ...
Reposted from No Right Turn Over the past few days, John Key has been talking up the "threat" of kiwis fighting in Syria, and the need for new laws to stop them leaving or returning to New Zealand. On the latter point, there's an obvious…
Last month the Australian covered "the biggest anti-terrorism raid in Australia's history" extensively, complete with picture of a sword "that police claim they were planning to use" according to Channel 10, and comment from prosecutor about the one person who turned up in court At…
On Tuesday, some police in Wellington raided Nicky Hager's house and in the course of 10 hours five police grabbed and held as evidence all of the computers, documents, cameras and any device that might contain data. The purported reason for this was not to…
Good news citizens! The National government has revealed unto us today the cause of poverty and inequality: Is it the neoliberal paradigm which has seen these problems skyrocket since the reforms of the 80's/90's? No! Is it the broken economic system which rewards the accumulation…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the mike ...
Reposted from No Right Turn Remember National's social housing policy? The one they campaigned on? The one that talked about how much money they were spending and was all about upgrading and investing in state houses? Somehow, post-election, its transmogrified into selling off a third…
The Inaugural Labour Day Celebratory Essay Competition 2014 may be of interest to potential entrants in the stated age group within your social and family networks. Please feel free to share the information below and encourage participation in this essay competition. Please note that because…
Yesterday Nicky Hager released a statement which began: Statement by Nicky Hager on police seizing property On Thursday, 2 October, five police arrived at my home with a warrant to search and seize property. I was in Auckland at the time for two days of…
As described in Hager's Dirty Politics, the Nats run a very successful "two tier" communications strategy. Key is Mr nice and blokey, Key's people run the vicious dirty politics stuff. It's a stunningly successful formula. Key ditching responsibility for the GCSB and SIS, and adopting…
Open mike is your post. For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose. The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy). Step up to the mike ...
So the police has raided Nicky Hager's home seeking information that may lead to the discovery of who Rawshark is. The investigation is obviously very politically charged as the raid could have a chilling effect on journalists investigating the Government using information which may have been…