Written By:
- Date published:
6:00 am, July 22nd, 2025 - 58 comments
Categories: open mike -
Tags:
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 …
Today's Posts (updated through the day):
Hey Federated Farmers climate change is real
New Post up:
Hey Federated Farmers climate change is real
Stuff has recently reported on a man holding the position of JP and as a government appointee authorised to visit prisons. He has resigned those posts.
It seems this individual's CV was somewhat embellished. How the appointments came to be made is now being examined.
It makes you wonder how many more like him are out there.
The link, in case you forgot.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/360764249/justice-appointee-resigns-everything-after-stuff-investigation-reveals-flawed-cv
Thanks Kay – from that link:
His dishonesty (towards others and perhaps himself) runs deep. The Yale law degree claim was deliberate, and so a falsehood – lie even – his 'mistake' was getting caught.
How now to put that gift to good use. Well, Lesā has experience in local body politics, and it only 35 – why not bung him on a political party list, after a suitable cooling off period of course.
What an ego. You would have to question the gullibility of those he fooled ? (I use that form as really…were they that naive? FFS)
I had nearly 30 years as a JP before I retired and I can vouch for the fact that there are unfortunately, a bunch of Justices who are not so much about service to the public, as promoting their own interests and egos.
They don't attend the training sessions, and they certainly don't do the Help Desks at the Courts or the CABs where you can help 30 or so people in 3 hours.
They have "JP" on their Facebook profiles and on their business cards.
Being a Justice is about giving service, not about status or self promotion.
Enough. Israel's (netanyahu and rightwing/fascist) war on the civilians of Gaza must end. There is no justification for what they are doing. It is murder plain and simple
The 25 countries that have signed the condemnation are:
Italy, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Australia, Canada, Iceland, Norway, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Switzerland, and Japan.
Impressive. Presumably countries such as Germany, India and Holland have not signed because they are governed by right wing parties who, like the USA, think genocide is just fine.
Impressive Indeed. Possibly Germany has previous reasons for not wanting to sign anything against Israel ? IMO of course…
Just want to put an FYI (as always, for the hard of understanding)
I do not dislike or hate Israelis or Jews.
I absolutely do dislike the Israeli fascist govt and its enablers…..
I travelled with Israelis in South America many years ago. They were wonderful.
Zionism is the problem-Netanyahu and friends have explicitly stated that they will never accept a two-state solution; that Palestine no longer exists (if it ever did in their opinion).
AI tells me that the 25 countries have 577 million people
I have also met (Bicycle and otherwise) Israeli's. I concur. And yes the fascist govt of that POS netanyahu have much to answer for and..I fervently hope, to.
I had these links from when the Hamas attack occurred…(Research an all) maybe of interest to someone?
People can make their own mind up…
They received two warnings. One of the planning, one of training for an attack.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-attack-intelligence.html?unlocked_article_code=1.YU8.0Po2.O5qIFj6Wc7o4&smid=url-share
SPC, thankyou for that NYT link. I was able to view it too. It does add to the How. As to the Why? IMHO it was in netanyahu and his fellow fascists best interests. As terrible as that is to comprehend.
The blood of so many…..
In political terms, it is the concept of Zionism as a state on historic borders, "eretz Israel".
The Likud and to its right political partners seek a Jewish state ruling over the entire Palestine mandate (which is itself not the entirety of eretz Israel, thus Golan Heights from Syria etc).
It is not within the rules of the UN to acquire land from another state.
The UN awarded an area for a second state west of the Jordan. But it was occupied by Jordan and Egypt from 1948-1967 (neither annexed the land into their states). And Israel since.
The Likud tactic has been to settle beyond its borders to create a de facto annexation. And reduce the areas of land that Palestinian can have.
Allowing the PA to preside over this decline delays formal annexation and the "requirement" to incorporate Palestinian populations into Israel.
Despite this, there is advocacy for annexing Area C (while Trump is POTUS).
Yes, if only people could make the connection that despising the actions of a government does not make one anti the race or the citizens. I learned that during the Soviet era, despite the fact we were indoctrinated into believing that "All Americans good, all Russians bad." My family connections to that part of the world meant I knew otherwise.
Aye, Kay ! Many..years ago ( Had an interest in History, and sadly,wars etc) I learned of the horror the Russian people had in WW2 under the nazi's.
Through my life I have found (as KJT's Research) that its not the average people who are at fault? to blame? but always..they who reap the whirlwind , said by that (IMO if not evil, a lesser Human) British Bomber Command leader Bomber Harris.
And yes…the Russians, Palestinian, Israeli people..deserve better.
The Baltic people had a pretty horrific time under the Soviet government.
Ok. I never said otherwise? I was talking about the Russian people.As I thought you were. Also did I say….I read History..a lot.
In Holland's case, presumably because it's part of the Netherlands!
Nor any bordering nation raising a note of support: Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, or Saudi Arabia.
Those are the countries that could assist directly.
You are of course aware of the agreements between Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and the US and that Syria is presently a bit of a basket case? The way this ends is the US finally says its time to stop to Israel.
State of the nation from an expert commentator: https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/07/22/anne-salmond-new-zealanders-deserve-better/
The only bit I disagree with is the radical zigzag: the left is too timid to do anything radical when they have the power to do so.
The left needs an agenda plus an action plan, so the Dame has used a subtle design scheme to prompt this:
She knows that Sir Geoffrey Palmer has spent a couple of decades advocating this, despite his voice seeming like a solitary squawk from a distant horizon.
So she follows that bald statement with a lack of specifics as to how to get that result. She knows leftists absolutely hate having to be specific, due to being adamant that a slogan is all you really need. It's a lovely subtle way of preaching to the converted.
She's sensible enough to realise that some leftists will dissent from the party line and wonder if doing something constructive instead is a better option. So I'm taking her omission to be a clever political strategy (rather than incompetence). Zen practitioners are well aware that an empty space is immensely usable. I suspect she knows this.
Of course you mean in your opinion…dont you? Or have you… links?
As usual, you’re chasing your own straw men. Anne Salmond is neither a Zen practitioner nor a politician, she’s a distinguished academic and public intellectual.
https://newsroom.co.nz/author/dame-anne-salmond/
When will you stop with your nonsensical hypotheticals & assumptions and stick to verifiable facts here?
"When will you stop with your nonsensical hypotheticals & assumptions and stick to verifiable facts here?"
He won't. He CAN'T,
Besides, he's probably considerably richer than you!
[You won’t and you can’t stop trolling here, despite your recent warning a week ago for the same troll comment (https://thestandard.org.nz/open-mike-15-07-25/#comment-2038652). Take a month off – Incognito]
Mod note
I bet some of your best friends are leftists.
I bet some of your best friends are leftists.
Has been true. More to the point, like me they have general affinities with leftist thought in various historical contexts, which gets revealed in instinctive ways in conversation, whilst being more independent in basic nature.
In terms of political impact, they tend to vote left more than right without being much impressed by either option most of the time, so we resonate with a large swathe of other kiwis despite being more inherently progressive…
With SkyTV buying TV3 for $1, it makes me think The Standard could have made an offer 🙂
It's a bit step in the concentration of opinion though.
How so ..?
What have we lost that was there before…?
I doubt it. Despite the low purchase price, you'd need significantly deep pockets to just keep it running, let alone make significant changes.
The Yarlung Tsangpo megadam will reportedly harness the power created by the river dropping 2km in about 50km as it winds through a canyon on a U-shaped bend.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jul/21/china-starts-building-world-biggest-hydropower-dam-yarlung-tsangpo-river-tibet
Given the stoush between India and Pakistan over the The Indus Waters Treaty, it seems that water protection is getting more imortant every day.
And we allow ours to be constantly polluted.
"India and Bangladesh have voiced concerns over the project, fearing the water could be held or diverted away from them.
The Yarlung Tsangpo becomes the Brahmaputra river as it flows south into India’s Arunachal Pradesh and Assam states and finally into Bangladesh as the Jamuna river. Damming it could affect millions of people downstream.
“China can always weaponise this water in terms of blocking it or diverting it,” Neeraj Singh Manhas, special adviser for South Asia at the Parley Policy Initiative, told the BBC in January."
The dismal performance of the opposition in Oz has created an opening for Shane: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/16-07-2025/echo-chamber-shane-jones-greatest-ever-australian-politician
Too bad the Spinoff didn't report Shane's response. If he can justify virtue signalling on demand from his leader you can see why Labour made him a cabinet minister: bipartisan appeal. Just what the loser oppo dudes across the ditch need!
It took me less than a minute to find Shane’s response, which is a miniscule effort if one is genuinely interested in the self-posed question rather than using it as rhetorical tool to spawn the usual ranty nonsense stuff.
https://www.parliament.nz/en/pb/hansard-debates/rhr/document/HansS_20250715_050940000/3-question-no-3-resources
The Education Ministry seems to be losing the plot. (And not for the first time. See The Numeracy Project, and Modern Learning Environments.)
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/567601/school-curriculum-rewrite-had-serious-problems-managers-considered-using-ai-to-help
"Internal Education Ministry documents sighted by RNZ reveal serious problems plagued the rewrite of the school curriculum earlier this year and managers were considering using AI to help with the work.
The latest leak from the organisation shows only a few months ago it lacked a clear definition of the core concept underpinning the entire rewrite – "knowledge rich" – even though it had already published primary school maths and English curriculums by that time and had nearly completed draft secondary school English and maths curriculums.
It was also struggling with repeated requests for changes.
Primary school principals and the secondary teachers union told RNZ they were worried about the curriculum development process.
They said they still had not seen a clear definition of the term 'knowledge-rich' as it applied to the New Zealand curriculum.
The Education Ministry told RNZ content of the English and maths curriculum was "consistent with knowledge-rich curriculum design principles" but it failed to provide a definition of knowledge-rich despite being asked for one."
Yet teachers are supposed to teach to the curriculum, and be judged accordingly.
Here's a thought…
Fletchers is asking for offers for it's construction business..
How about one of those cash-heavy super funds .and/or the like..
..buying said construction business…
..and directing it to build all the social housing that we so need ..?
Is this an opportunity to be grabbed..?
All the infrastructure is there ..to make this eminently doable…
IMHO..
One problem Philip. Those cash heavy super funds need to make a profit on their investments.
I understand that imperative…and would note that $100 million plus has been the losses over the last six years…for fletchers..
But I feel that running cost needs to be balanced against the strong social imperative we have.. namely to house our ever increasing numbers of homeless…
(How else will we do it…?)
The infrastructure is all there ..this would be eminently doable…
And sell it again…once that need has been addressed .?
And I never mentioned the gummint..’cos there is no way these bastards would consider doing that .
A lab/grn/tmp gummint might take a different view .
(There’s a strong election promise..eh..?
We’re gonna do it .and this is how it’s gonna be done..!
I would upgrade that 'strong election promise '..
..to an election-winning promise…
And that construction infrastructure need not only concentrate on social housing …
It could also work on all that other stuff we wring our hands about ..
..and do little else ..
Think of it as an off the hook/shelf..I dunno..ministry of works ..?
“It is not that pretty a picture” for the Government, the polling report said.
Gosh anybody really surprised……..does National have a secret rescue helicopter on its way……
https://www.thepost.co.nz/politics/360765524/poll-suggests-national-headed-one-term-government
That is a teaser….it is paywalled beyond the first paragraph.
Do you have access Kat, and if so would you broadcast the numbers please?
I could read the second paragraph, which says it's Talbot Mills polling. There's a fairly recent (1 – 10 July) Talbot Mills poll result at the top of the table in this link:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_New_Zealand_general_election#Table_of_polls
Labour lead the Nats by 3% – same as for the Talbot Mills poll taken 1 – 10 March.
Labour 35%
Nats — 32%
Greens 12%
ACT —— 8%
NZFirst – 7%
TPM —– 3.8%
Thanks Drowsy…assuming what you say is right (which I'm sure it is):
Lab 35.0 Gre 12.0 TPM 3.8=50.8
Nat 32.0 ACT 8.0 NZF 7.0=47.0
That would be a 3.8% lead for the Left and a fine result in 2026.
Hi BG…I am using win 11…if you delete your browsing history which should clear the cache….the link opens up for complete article…….
tps://www.thepost.co.nz/politics/360765524/poll-suggests-national-headed-one-term-government
Thanks Kay – that 'trick' worked for me using a Mac OS and Firefox browser.
Next year, expect the CoC (there being no chance, barring a war with China, of a NAct-only govt in 2026) to campaign on being the strong and stable coalition Kiwis need to fix the cost of living crisis – and what I would just say to you is it's all Labour's fault the economy’s not growing. Isn’t that right Nicola – Nicola?
Whoops – sorry – thanks Kat.
All good DM.K…….I find clearing cache also stops the irritating "log in to continue" nonsense from Stuff and other sites.
Thanks Kat….will give that a go.
Old Luxo is feeling the pressure of staring down the barrel of being our very own bald headed opne term David Brent PM….
"I'm not taking any lectures from frickin' Chris Hipkins or the Labour Party," he said "They have no idea what to do. They put us in this mess."
Dear dear, Luxo is having a bit of a tanty.
He would stand around and just babble on and on about nothing, until finally he was saved by the buzz– BZZZZZZT.
MODERATOR: Your time is up, Mr Luxon.
I'm with the jackal on this one. I tried to talk TVNZ into it when I was in the newsroom, just for me though, and encountered the expected knee-jerk negative response. "You mean you think it's possible to be adaptive? What a crazy notion. Even considering the possibility is giving me the jitters. This is state bureaucracy, where innovation is only acceptable to management if directed by the hierarchy."
They put us on a rotating mid-night to dawn shift, which screws up all your biorhythms. I figured dropping down to 4 days would allow me to cope better, so I told them I didn't need the pay for the 5th day. No loss to the org right? So they freaked out anyway.
Here's a thought:
Businesses open 7 days a week…A job share formula of 3.5 days work for each worker..
Or..3 x 10 hour days …and four days off..
Or …or ..
You were at least willing to accept lower pay for the shorter work week. The research you quote, which found that "employees with a reduction of eight hours or more per work week self-reported experiencing larger reductions in burnout and improvements in job satisfaction" was for the case where they worked a twenty percent shorter work week and got the same pay. I find it very hard to imagine anyone who would not prefer that.
I wonder what they would have said about a twenty percent shorter working week for twenty percent less pay?
There is no bottom.
.
/
.
On Friday U.S. district judge David G. Estudillo ruled the priests were "likely to succeed" in their lawsuit and issued a preliminary injunction blocking that part of the law.
A federal judge has ruled that Catholic priests in Washington state cannot be required to report child abuse or neglect they learn about through confession after the Trump administration intervened in their favor.
Three Roman Catholic bishops had sued the state government over a new law — SB 5375 — that would extend mandatory abuse reporting rules to the sacrament of confession despite the Church's absolute ban on revealing such secrets.
[…]
"There is no question that SB 5375 burdens plaintiffs’ free exercise of religion," Estudillo wrote. "In situations where Plaintiffs hear confessions related to child abuse or neglect, SB 5375 places them in the position of either complying with the requirements of their faith or violating the law…
"As [the plaintiff] stated, any priest who directly violates the sacramental seal incurs automatic excommunication, and thereby risks eternal damnation…
"Ultimately, Washington’s failure to demonstrate why it has an interest of the highest order in denying an exemption to clergy while making such exemptions available to other professionals who work with underserved children is likely fatal."
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/washington-state-child-abuse-catholic-priests-b2791985.html
Re..I saw a film some years back, which really did make me question even more (I was already aware). Its about the Boston Globe Investigation….and the hidden.
There are probably many more films/documentaries…