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6:00 am, March 18th, 2025 - 60 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 …
Watched with interest and a little humour as Luxon stepped off the plane in India and immediately announced the trip a success.
Then I realized what he must have meant – the plane didn't break down on the way there…
"Luxon's epic unpopularity on one chart" – Should I Stay ir Should I Go?
Well, "Everyone Must Go".
I certainly prefer the Spinoff to the ‘Centrist’.
Hang in there Luxflake – you were anointed by Sir Key himself (McCulloch Menzies, Lane Walker Rudkin, Elders Finance, Bankers Trust, Merrill Lynch ["the smiling assassin"], MP, PM, Air NZ, ANZ, Palo Alto Networks), and your ‘sorted’ brand (Unilever, Air NZ, MP, PM, ?) can only get better.
Up next – Seymour ("engineering sector", a Canadian think tank on "the libertarian or social conservative side of the true-blue ideological spectrum", MP, deputy PM, ???)
Another striking thing from that graph is just how effective the completely manufactured "winter of discontent" was in 2000, Clark's first full year in office. This was when the NZ's extremely conservative business establishment was given a megaphone by Fran O'Sullivan and the NZ Herald to essentially reject the 1999 election result – not in electoral terms obviously, but in terms of the public policy implications.
Brave? Oblivious? Smug? Damned if I know…
C'mon… entitled and sorted.
Luxon cuddles up (literally) to far right leader.
Should we be worried about this? IMO..hell yes.
And on to lunch.
Oh…really ? Modi has eliminated some….things.
Modi . Far right.
In the real world, protocol often requires delivering flowery praise to right-wing strongmen with abhorrent politics. It's just the way foreign policy works sometimes.
But Luxon could at least manage it with a shred of dignity.
Instead, he looks like a schoolboy awkwardly receiving an award from the principal rather than a leader engaging in serious diplomacy. And you have to ask serious questions about a man who can't even get smiling and waving right.
Ahuh. Is that some patronisation perchance? I merely linked to Modi and his membership of a far right (some describe as fascist) group. His repression of dissent, minority groups, et al needed some light. However Luxon blurts…
Would you be so pragmatic if he hypothetically flew to say…Moscow and met with Putin?
I'm not saying the RSS isn't fascist. Or that the BJP isn’t a morally bankrupt, authoritarian party that has consolidated power by exploiting historical caste and religious divisions and outright condoning anti-Muslim violence. Or even that Modi isn’t an authoritarian strongman dragging Indian democracy into the mud.
What I am saying is that in diplomacy, smaller states like New Zealand don’t have much choice in how they push back against larger powers they desperately need something from—like, say, a free trade agreement.
So I get why the PM has to make the right noises in a press conference to secure what we need behind closed doors.
What irks me is that he managed to do it while looking like a grinning, fawning, vacuous buffoon. It was almost like an empty plane landed in India, and Christopher Luxon got out.
Diplomacy isn’t a moral purity contest. If New Zealand needed something badly enough, a PM should absolutely engage with Putin—just like other Western leaders have, even while denouncing him.
The issue isn’t that Luxon met Modi. It’s that he did so like a clueless sycophant, seemingly prepared to whitewash outright ethnic cleansing in pursuit of a deal that delivers nothing of substance.
Thanks for reply and being honest enough to say your thoughts on.
I would definitely agree that Luxon is falling over everything (his own feet, Modi's repressions, et al) with a kind of manic desperation to save (IMO) his own ass…..
Reply to psyching
This trip, I tried something new and checked out some of the local India media, to see what India thinks about the delegation.
Generally those papers don't talk about much other than Luxon coming to India and Modi giving up some time to him and they both talked about cricket.
It didn't sound like the game-changer that's posted locally.
I wondered if the trip is an attempt to woo the South-Asian vote, come 2026.
He did take his $900 per day grifter with him to show off as his most devoted Indian.
Unsurprising considering Modi's repression of dissenting views. I suppose like most media here, some Indian (version Herald, et al) will be fully in step with…others maybe fearful are not offering too much alternate takes on anything …
Re Luxons woo? Apart from his palpable desperation for something…anything, positive; there could be a factor of vote woo also….
From the Conversation.
https://theconversation.com/trump-is-surveying-australian-academics-about-gender-diversity-and-china-what-does-this-mean-for-unis-and-their-research-252282?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20March%2018%202025%20-%203300633704&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20March%2018%202025%20-%203300633704+CID_aa633c0971b91b38b29bf381bdf3ef85&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=Trump%20is%20surveying%20Australian%20academics%20about%20gender%20diversity%20and%20China%20%20what%20does%20this%20mean%20for%20unis%20and%20their%20research
Some of the questions to the research universities.
”Some of the specific questions include:
Cartel style.
https://x.com/ValentinaForUSA/status/1901441849979535380
She may well be the public face of a competing cartel who did a better job of buying off local police and ICE officials.
Just occasionally our media representatives fulfill their proper function of shining a light into a dark corner so the public know what has been going on.
An example is the Stuff coverage of the awarding of a $2 million contract by Health NZ to a UK company of which an ACC manager was formerly a director. At the time the contract was awarded, the manager was advising Health NZ on system performance and accountability.
No tender was called for the work, apparently because the UK company was the only outfit capable of doing the job (reducing patient waiting lists). This point has been disputed by NZ businesses.
Maybe everything is above board, but it is vital the 4th estate gets onto these issues and, even more importantly, the bureaucrats know they are being watched and will be held to account.
I’m puzzled why you didn’t link to the article!?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360611085/2m-contract-senior-govt-advisors-business-partner
Good point, thanks for putting it up.
Crony capitalism. Bill could whip up something as he knows as much about health as housing.
Waiting lists reflect a lack of resources, long ED waits caused through that and a lack of available GP's.
Its fixed by funding it not robbing it blind.
The logical end-point of anti-trans propaganda:
New [W. Virgina] Republican bills seek to ban trans people from public spaces, and refer to them as ‘obscene’
The bills 'classes being trans as a “sexual deviation”. '
'Senate Bill 195 classes trans people as “obscene” and aims to ban “transgender exposure, performances, or display” to minors, essentially criminalising public presence of trans people.'
No going within 1000 yards of a school, etc, in case kids catch the trans.
This is tabled legislation yet to pass. A recent W. Virginia bill defining 'male' and 'female' included a clause that would have allowed medical personnel, eg school nurses, to inspect children's genitals without parental consent. But that clause was removed before becoming law, because that was seen as contravening parental rights, not in any sense of protecting the kids.
There are "trans" kids like there are vegan cats. Someone else is making the decision. The usual answer is a homophobic parent who is terrified of having a "gay" child because that child does not immediately conform to rigid sex stereotypes.
Aahh..!… that's a contentious subject…for some…
Vegan cats and vegan dogs.,
..not for me… I've been doing the vegan dog/cat thing for a quarter of a century..
..ask me anything…
And you are making the decision on what those animals eat. Point made.
yep.
and the logical end-point of anti-feminist TRA propaganda: girls are forced to undress in front of a male student. Despite there being gender neutral options for the male student. Staff, including senior, made the girls go to the locker room and change.
https://x.com/ReduxxMag/status/1900991195020513297
Maybe it's time the left got its shit together and started listening to each other.
I'm not sure you are right about that. I haven't read the legislation, but the clause is about parental consent not parental rights.
Kentucky GOP lawmakers vote to protect conversion therapy
https://apnews.com/article/conversion-therapy-kentucky-cf61c100f6aad954a43e45f25dbd316c?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=share
I do think Team Trump and other right wing gender conservatives (eg Brian Tamaki) are patriarchal and anti-trans and are putting trans & gender non-conformists in danger, physically, socially and politically.
However, those like me who oppose discrimination and abuse of trans IDed people, and who also acknowledge the reality of 2 immutable human sexes, male and female, while seeing gender self ID is subjective, fluid &unstable, also get labelled anti-trans by a lot of those on the political left.
The patriarchal and identitarian right in the US are leading a strong backlash against the extreme, authoritarian, neoliberal, trans rights activism embraced by the many in the political left in the west.
Jane Clare Jones, a radical materialist feminist, has been looking into what is happening, especially with Trumpist USA, and in this post analyses some of the pendulum swings. "Against Identitarianism: Or, In Defence of Nuance."
I find JCJ's posts on this topic to be very useful. She cites a lot of sources that I wasn't previously familiar with. On the gender issues I agree with JCJ that the left need to get beyond the 'us' and 'them', look more at the realities and nuances, and find a way forward against the frightening upsurge in deceptive, plutocratic, authoritarian right wing politics.
I would not call trans right activism, neo-liberal or authoritarian – if anything it is part of radical libertarianism, thus untempered – extremist. ACT never contended with it.
Neo-liberals on the political and economic right supported it to make society with greater inequality seem more inclusive and modern. Thus National said nothing (like ACT also supporting self ID).
Social progressives, centrist and centre left and left were on board, rather then side with social conservatives.
Some feminists opposed it, but many did not.
The current trans rights theory originated in the US, and was first openly embraced politically by President Obama with an EO, in 2014. The US Democrat Party hierarchy is pretty neoliberal. Some big pharma corporations had jumped on board at some point seeing the possibility for a lucrative niche market. The number of gender clinics exploded in the US between 2007 and 2022.
The Tories were the first UK party to introduce policy for it in 2018.It got stalled when other political priorities overshadowed it like Brexit. Other parties followed. The first opposition to it in the UK was from some Labour and Green party members and voters, some of whom were trade unionists. The UK (I think left wing parties) also introduced the #no debate mantra, and the censoring of opposing views to it.
The approach has long been to censor, no-platform, and demonise any opponents. This includes going after people's jobs, trying to criminalise them. UK policing has been focused on criminalising, arresting etc, opponents to the TRA theory and demands.
From early on, sex self ID, "trans women are women" etc was a top down authoritarian movement, and backed by big corporations. In NZ the GP introduced sex self ID before anyone really knew anything much about it. It followed the UK #no-debate and censoring MO. NZ corporations embraced it early by adopting the Rainbow Tick, which by 2019 was pretty much dominated by Transgender theory & demands. eg Fonterra.
Many local and international corporations embraced this theory from early on. Look at all the corporations that have adopted the NZ Rainbow Tick. The result is they and many public sector organisations adopted transgenderism well before most of the population knew what was involved. It has been a top-down,authoritarian movement.
The first person to pick up on what was happening in NZ was Renee Gerlich in about 2014. She was viciously smeared and censored. She opposed sex self ID, and drew other women's attention to it. Out of that came Speak Up for Women, largely consisting of left wing women. Here is the text of a talk Renee gave in 2019, in which she explains why the TRA movement was neoliberal.
"This is neoliberalism: the commodification of nature, and the removal and defunding of social services, ramped up for the age of multinational corporations."
Renee refers to the Shock Doctrine and then says:
Jane Clare Jones on the authoritarianism of the transgender movement in the UK.
Also, it's hard to gauge how many left wing women are opposed to the current TRA theory and sex self ID. This is because many women are afraid to speak out because of the silencing, censoring and demonisation that happens. I know many who don't speak out because they are afraid it will impact negatively on their jobs. I know one or two who have had TRAs go after their jobs
We'll not agree on this.
Greens?
Gender was used in place of sex for ID purposes by 1999.
https://www.legislation.govt.nz/regulation/public/1999/0100/latest/DLM281326.html
https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/12060/georgina-beyer
The later change was from managed recognition process to self ID.
All parties supported self ID and not one MP voted against it.
All policy is top down as and when adopted by government.
But not self ID. There was slippage to using 'gender' to mean sex in the 1990s I think, tho it maybe began earlier.
I have read it was Ruth Bader Ginsburg that first enshrined the slippage in US law, maybe because many in the US didn't like using the word 'sex' because of the links with meaning sexual activity. It gained traction internationally after that.
But it took longer for the notion of 'gender identity', and then sex/gender self identity, to be incorporated in the current trans theory. It's the problem of the meaning of 'gender' that confuses many people. It's an unstable and slippery concept.
That mention of Beyer being transgender is revisionism. Beyer was always known as "transsexual". In 2007 it was reported:
In 2018 Beyer said:
RBG was simply running with the feminist advocacy for "gender equality" speaking to equal participation in society, which was part of the 1960's.
The concept of gender distinct from birth sex, rather than as an interchangeable terminology (as the 1960's feminists were using it) was a separate matter.
But it was a known before 1980, as this was all was part of the DSM 3 in 1980.
GB was of the era when there was transvestite and transsexual, and she chose to be the latter.
Note this quote, as to being the same as those who call themselves transgender
And this
The nuance.
And this
A separate reference to sex and gender in the HRA would be useful.
There transgender could be a category, as could gender expression.
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1807/S00244/qa-georgina-beyer-interviewed-by-corin-dann.htm
Most people self-ID about something. I’ve come to believe that who/what adults identify as is none of my business, if they're behaving within the law.
People who object to certain types of self-ID, for example gender self-ID (legal in Aotearoa NZ), are free to lobby for law changes. And, if there is strong evidence (cf. belief) that ostensibly progressive laws are actually doing more harm than good, then that lobbying might stand a fair chance of success.
As your link notes self-ID on DL and passports since 2012.
Thus from sex ID to gender ID, then onto self ID.
Otherwise there was managed transition to realise formal gender ID change at least until parliamentary legislation – Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Registration Bill (first introduced in 2017 and passed in 2023)
Ireland, a country of 5 mi, similar in many cultural ways to NZ, has had self-id for trans people since 2015. They publish the stats: equal numbers of trans men and women seek self-id, and the numbers are quite low.
Guess what. If there were any stats whatsoever about increased exual assaults in Irish toilets by male sexual predators who used self-id as women, the numbers would have been published ad nauseum in the UK anti-trans press. But nothing. Not a sausage.
A sexual predator doesn’t need self-id to harass people in public spaces.
Classifying being trans a sexual deviancy and calling being within a km of a school indecent exposure.
Identifying being trans as a sexual deviation is based on two concepts
1not dressing like one of their birth sex.
2.proscribing their sexuality.
Then this
1.a focus on those born males identifying as of the female gender. This is not the
the patriarchy being misogynist. It's just anger at those not part of their broliarchy …
2.a step towards punishing those born female who do not dress like Christian women puritans. Either because of their resistance to gender conformity or a lack of modesty.
This all leads to pejorative views of homosexuality, non procreative sex acts & non marital sexual relationships, in a roll back of progressive liberalism.
Christian dominionism.
GEEZ
https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360605837/stuff-politics-live-blog
He definitely displays narcissist characteristics. dv
Plus his deflecting responsibility is concerning. In his Jack Tame interview about the lunch problems, he intoned those complaining were "conspiracy theorists". Right, so if anyone complains they will now be called that, and that deflects from the the main idea. Now he is marshalling the power of religion to give the Act Party credence. Whatever next? Bishop David Seymour of the Act Party?
He wishes to bring his brand of Religion to Councils. “God help us!!”
Political 101: shoot the messenger.
Well, Seymour did bemoan Labour's "war on landlords", who are treated "like al-Qaeda", and claimed that "If Nelson Mandela was alive today he would be campaigning for ACT.", so his delusional claim that Jesus would have supported ACT is hardly unsurprising – this is our deputy PM in waiting, FFS.
So what's Seymour's plan to close our 7-year ethnicity gap in average life expectancy?
And what might Seymour and ACT party donors make of the idea that all Kiwis are entitled to an equal measure of prosperity, I wonder.
Oops, maybe that should be "hardly surprising"?
Do journos fear him ? Patsy question when school lunches and his ministry of waste go unchallenged.
The amount of dribble that comes from Atlas jnr reported ad nauseum from the media must make the hollowmen smile.
Are journos mainly employed by RW media owned by RW and paid to espouse RW talking points ?
MSM is not the ordinary person's friend.
🙄
To which one might quote Matthew 6 verse 24.
ACT – Association of Consumers and Taxpayers.
Then again Matthew 22: 15 – 22
Jesus gives the first recorded MMT lecture right there.
Oh crikey, now he's spouting Latin tags, like a certain former UK PM. Will that immaculate 'do soon be getting mussed up in further homage?
If Labour wants to have a shot at it in 2026, it needs to control the narrative and to do so means to get your story straight.
https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/03/17/labours-changed-public-private-partnerships-message/
FFS, sharpen up, Labour!
Once again, they show themselves to be lacking in abiding principles.
They give the appearance of being aware of the worse excesses of the 'market' but bereft of any idea of an alternative.
They are facing the same problems as the democrats in america…
However flawed his vision is… trump had a vision for change…that he sold to enough voters..
Whereas the democrats have no competing vision…
.. and in response to trump…are showing themselves as both rudderless and useless…
Which brings us back to labour…
(..and my abiding fear they are planning on just some more of the incrementalism they have relied on..in place of any vision/pathway to fixing what ails us..for decades..)
Could someone from labour please tell me that I am wrong…and that labour are working like Energizer bunnies on a version of the grand plan…
Idiots
That is the playbook of the RW attack trying to be launched by the CoCs (Hard c's)
.
The last surviving Battle of Britain pilot, John "Paddy" Hemingway, has died at the age of 105.
Mr Hemingway, who was originally from Dublin, joined the Royal Air Force [RAF] as a teenager before World War Two.
At 21, he was a fighter pilot in the Battle of Britain, a three-month period when air force personnel defended the skies against a large-scale assault by the German air force, the Luftwaffe.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg1z42pkj8o
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hemingway_(RAF_officer)
Well that's certainly an end of an era, I do have vague memories of my father and older brothers taking me to see the movie decades ago.
BTW, a New Zealander, Sir Keith Park, was the General Officer in Command of the day to day air battle, during the Battle of Britain, he also went on to command the RAF's air defence during the siege of Malta.
Talking of World War two, David Seymour, our "Minister of Catering" and new boyfriend of Jesus, would do well to remember the sacrifices of the men and women who fought and died during the second world war. The fruits of victory for for all of us, not just the lucky and wealthy. I'm hoping with the baby Jesus now a follower of ACT, the minister of Catering will be reminded of a few things, like "the loaves and fishes", "those who have much, much is expected", "it's easier for a Camel to go through the eye of a needle, than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God", along with the commandment about taking the Lord's name in vain…
Mandela, Jesus, whoever next – Aslan? At least our next deputy PM is having a laugh.
Yes!! Drowsy M. Kram. 100%