The National Government has done a great job at silencing criticism of immigration from the liberal-left. Until recently any mention of concern over the deluge of migrants coming into the country under various guises has been greeted with claims that critics are zenophobic or even racist.
The tip line has been running hot as to the real reasons behind Hekia Parata’s sudden decision to stand down from Parliament at the next election.
The socially-just, ecologically-sustainable and peace-making America we are all hoping for is unlikely to be fully realised under President Hillary Clinton, but a great deal more of it will be brought into existence under her leadership than under Donald Trump’s.
Working people lost a hero on Friday. We knew Helen Kelly’s death was imminent, but nothing could really prepare us for losing such a powerful voice for fairness and justice.
Something remarkable happened this year at the United Nations General Assembly. Seven Pacific nations used the occasion to speak out for their neighbours in Indonesian- controlled West Papua. It was decades ago when the world body last witnessed this kind of multi-nation lobby. Bold Vanuatu has been close to a lone voice in recent years.
The NZ Greens should see this as their time. Instead, the political sock puppet that is James Shaw has seen fit to by himself invent a new history, invent a new policy and sell it to an electorate who aren’t much interested.
The bizarre gladiatorial orgy of gross absurdity between Clinton and Trump will damage the American psyche in a way I don’t think it can return from. Either candidate will inherit a White House that is smeared with lies and bitter resentment.
We can build private prisons, but we can’t build houses for the homeless. We can’t build affordable housing but we can build tax havens. We can give away billions in tax cuts but we can’t fund suicide prevent programs properly.
I recommend the Select Committee not proceed with this Bill in its present form. Overall it puts New Zealanders in a worse situation than in already existing legislation, in relation to both their personal privacy and their right to untrammeled freedom of expression.
One of the most interesting things about the last 8 years in NZ has been the dumping of rational and empirical evidence based social policy. We don’t implement policy based on facts now, we implement ideologically extreme brain farts.