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6:00 am, May 10th, 2026 - 17 comments
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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 …
Looks like British politics has been hit by some kind of sea-change in mass sentiment. As zeitgeist, I'm finding it hard to read, but the numbers still being finalised are trending in tsunami-like proportions. I get that Labour's brand is now widely seen as toxic, but none of the expert commentators seem able to explain why this is so. Jim Mora had a Brit public intellectual on his show this morning who also danced around the point.
Calling for Starmer's head to roll is trad behaviour but the calls are widespread. I'm impressed that none of them have accused him of doing something wrong. The political logic seems to be that if the party is clueless and the public votes them down, then shooting the leader is necessary. Hard to get any dumber than that, eh?
Anyway, torpidity in Labour ethos is evident here: https://www.thecanary.co/opinion/2026/04/04/corbyn-ex-tories-walsall/. A bunch of left-wingers giving Corbyn a hard time for being insufficiently purist in his praxis. Your Party seems not to have featured in coverage of the election so far. The attempt to provide a positive alternative to Labour surprised many when its dual leadership promptly did a schism straight down the middle of the thing. Seems to have been an attempt to remind all that splitterism is alive and well on the left as a perennial praxis option…
The powers that be ought not to be seen as wrong, so the Speaker asked the court to rewrite its decisions:
So easy for the pillars of the establishment to screw up! All the devil needs to do is nudge the mind of the judge when he's writing his decision. God's will be done, since he created his devilish agent, is omniscient so he knows the devil's mind, and omnipotent so he can change whatever the devil does if unsatisfactory.
Optionality is so important! Instead of being compelled by the law to accept the woman, TMP now has an unlimited period of time to think about it. She will be seen as part of it by many, regardless, but what does the TMP hierarchy care? She will act as an MP belonging to TMP even if the party hierarchy fails to accept her. Brownlee will be entertained by the prospect of this in-the-tent, outside-the-tent binary flicker (or not)…
Thanks for attempting to advise confused minds like mine about the TPM imbroglio. There will be a Maori word for where TPM is at but I don't know that at the moment. It seems that there is an unfortunate frivolity that overtakes many women on gaining serious positions of power?
Some Maori women politicians seem to want to be an Evita. Starting with Mrs Harawira calling for Maori women to be heard more, then I remember some more – Donna Awatere Huata*, Paula Bennett and now this latest female warrior upsetting hard-won TPM support apparently for personal esteem, and glory to her hapu?
*https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/300541119/former-politician-and-husband-removed-from-land-they-have-occupied-for-35-years
This is where we are going if the right win.
https://open.substack.com/pub/ifloz/p/i-watched-kamalas-speech-while-folding?
”THE WOMAN IN AISLE 4
Let me tell you about her, in Kamala’s words first.
She is a mother of three children. She receives SNAP benefits. She likes to do hair, but she needs a license. So she’s putting herself through cosmetology school. Her weekly budget for food for the four of them is $150.
150 a week. To feed 4 human beings. That is roughly the price of one Costco run for me, which is the kind of sentence that should make you feel something, and if it doesn’t, this isn’t the column for you.
Kamala went grocery shopping with her. Walked the aisles. Watched her put cans of off-brand vegetables and the cheapest ground beef and a loaf of bread and the plastic-cup version of Chef Boyardee into the cart. Watched the math happen in her head as she went. We’ve all seen another mother do that math. Some of us have done that math.
Then Kamala asked her, gently, what was in the cart for her. Just for her.
Nothing.
This is what Kamala said next, and I want you to read it slow.
She will eat whatever the kids don’t eat.”
I am aware of the difficulties of poor mothers trying to hold a home together and look after a child, and improve her position.
And I got very upset when NZ Greens moved Metiria Turei* because she took on an extra boarder who she didn't declare to the government. (Boarders aren't wealth makers, they eat, and use utilities that must be paid for. But they are given a place to live, which is a wonderful thing which should be recognised as a Good Thing.)
The fact that the govt totally screws poor families with a single solo mother (on some ingrained prejudice and supposed moral principle hah!) was an occasion for the Greens to stand firm for Metiria but no, they cringed and cow
I have read that in the USA as mothers tried to get to a stable personal financial footing and abetter paying job (women always seem to be on lower wages anyway), some used their cars as dwellings for their families, some took up prostitution (an ancient form of earning when times force it, ('Needs must when the devil drives', TQ AI).
Our society has taken up and continues with petty, dishonest, moralistic attitudes to the vulnerable. (That is why Jeff Epstein etc are such media targets.) If we respected each other, and understood what is needed to become a 'warm' person capable in life and good to know, we would have to change much. But we are very pliable, able to live and talk at one level with aplomb, and at another behave worse than rats, (that apparently can make good pets).
Look how our pollies behave while pretending to be great and we let them, and will vote them in again when we know just what creeps they are. So it is always a case of fighting ourselves and choosing the best of the possibly tainted and treating each other with some tolerance. This is exactly what is needed, and just being true to one ideology or religion isn't half enough to achieve a 'decent' society.
* https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/337000/metiria-turei-felt-and-sounded-like-so-many-of-us
The Greens "cringed and cow"? That's not how I remember it.
The Nats aren’t good economic managers? NO! That’s simply another Lefty-Greeny-Socialist porky – Nicky No Boats will go in history as our biggliest economic brain ever.
DMK Thanks for that. I feel that the Greens should have made a louder call about this and why Metiria was stepping down.
It didn't impress me and indicate to me that the Greens were prepared to step up to where Labour had stood where there was a place for lefties.
All now seem too middle class and full of propriety etc till when they can retire and regard themselves as deserving and entitled. And critics of others like the old man complaining to the bus company that my relative drove for, because he would toot his horn when passing his parents' place next door. The old guy said he got a shock and could have fallen over and hurt himself.
Meanwhile the real hurt to young and vulnerable NZs goes on as they are elbowed out of their citizenship and the ordinary lives they could expect. It is an attitude of mind and if Greens can become more robust about people's needs along with the environment and naturally wild, it would be appreciated, thank you.
What do NZ and Hungary have in common? Seems their scenario and ours have some similarities.
This is a good report from DW News and I think Jason Reed – putting it up quickly but have to get some other things done. Good stuff I think. 20.27
Great cartoon on amalgamation on Scoop. What will be left of value of NZ by election time?
https://wellington.scoop.co.nz/?p=179826 PaulGolightly
Amalgamation – will Bigger be Better?
Well, it depends on your theory of the public sector, management, and economics.
As someone whose Masters research was on the general inapplicability of private-sector culture and rationales to the public sector, my short answer to whether amalgamations produce better outcomes is: no.
My long answer is: fuuuuuuuucccccckkkk no.
The evidence for large-scale public-sector amalgamations consistently delivering the efficiencies promised is actually pretty weak. What they reliably do produce is years of organisational disruption, expensive systems integration, governance confusion, management churn, loss of local knowledge, and endless restructuring costs.
I’m a data architect by trade with over a decade of experience in local government. And honestly, if I had not just started a new role in February, I would probably be eyeing up a move into consulting.
Because if this government seriously pursues large-scale amalgamation and restructuring, there is going to be an absolute goldmine in systems integration, data migration, platform consolidation, reporting redesign, governance remediation, identity management, process harmonisation, procurement rationalisation, and organisational clean-up work.
Consultants, systems integrators, software vendors, recruiters, and transformation managers are going to feast.
Whether ratepayers or local democracy will is a slightly different question.
There is always money in changing the existing system for consultants, and exponents of change.
"my short answer to whether amalgamations produce better outcomes is: no."
Well, yes. No. No one inside of local government thinks there will be clear improvements. The only wildly enthusiastic promoters of the plan are the few mayors who hope to be top o' the pile and the industries that are presently restrained by regulation set by councils. They're collectively, a horrid crew.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/594775/committee-recommends-disestablishing-environment-ministry-despite-public-opposition
Must be that mandate again
Thanks for that link BK.
Our CoC govt (by and for the sorted) ‘thinks’ marginalising Mother Nature is for the best.
https://www.greenpeace.org/aotearoa/story/greenpeace-submits-against-the-regulatory-standards-bill-and-its-far-right-fringe-ideas/
The amalgamation of the Councils in the Auckland Region, I believe has not been an outstanding success, from all reports.