The Daily Blog Open Mic – 4th February 2025
Announce protest actions, general chit chat or give your opinion on issues we haven’t covered for the day.
The Editor doesn’t moderate this blog, 3 volunteers do, they are very lenient to provide you a free speech space but if it’s just deranged abuse or putting words in bloggers mouths to have a pointless argument, we don’t bother publishing.
All in all, TDB gives punters a very, very, very wide space to comment in but we won’t bother with out right lies or gleeful malice. We leave that to the Herald comment section.
EDITORS NOTE: – By the way, here’s a list of shit that will get your comment dumped. Sexist abuse, homophobic abuse, racist abuse, anti-muslim abuse, transphobic abuse, Chemtrails, 9/11 truthers, Qanon lunacy, climate deniers, anti-fluoride fanatics, anti-vaxxer lunatics, 5G conspiracy theories, the virus is a bioweapon, some weird Bullshit about the UN taking over the world and ANYONE that links to fucking infowar.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/540832/disappointed-bed-bath-and-beyond-criticised-for-calling-27-374-sales-of-non-compliant-items-isolated-oversights
Health and safety regs decades ago followed up some fires of kids getting burnt with pjs getitng too close to heaters or fireplaces and brought in a ruling that it was a huge threat if kids pjs weren’t elasticised at the ankle and perhaps the arms. Quite a good idea and if they cared about children it would seem worthy but they don’t, and it was a minor problem as far as numbers were concerned, out of the lucky dip when more important things would help materially.
WTF Gormenghast is turning really ghastly.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has announced he is now acting administrator of the US Agency for International Development, confirming the de-facto takeover of the humanitarian agency by the State Department.
The news came hours after Elon Musk, the world’s richest man charged with overhauling the federal government, said President Donald Trump had signed off on shutting the agency down.
Rubio said the “functions of USAID” must align with US foreign policy and that it is “a completely unresponsive agency.”
Rubio said he is serving as acting administrator of USAID, but said he has “delegated the authority” to someone else with whom he is in touch. The acting USAID administrator had previously been Jason Gray – CNN has asked the State Department if this is the person Rubio referenced.
“It’s supposed to respond to policy directives of the State Department, and it refuses to do so,” he claimed.
Asked about the arguments that USAID’s work is vital to national security and promoting US interests, Rubio said, “there are things that USAID, that we do through USAID, that we should continue to do, and we will continue to do.’
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/540827/apocalypse-at-usaid-as-musk-and-trump-work-to-dismantle-agency.