Why is the head of the bloody NSA in NZ during a massive cyber attack on the US?

US spy chief's NZ secret blown
The head of a United States intelligence agency has been paying what until yesterday had been a secret visit to Wellington for talks with his New Zealand counterparts. A US Embassy spokeswoman last night confirmed that the director of the National Security Agency, Lieutenant-General Keith Alexander, was in New Zealand for consultations with Government officials. "We have nothing further to add," she said. General Alexander's presence became known after he was apparently spotted by a reporter for an internet news service who saw him entering a Wellington building accompanied by security personnel. The NSA is responsible for collecting and analysing foreign communications and foreign signals intelligence.
It also protects American Government communications and information systems. The New Zealand equivalent is the Government Communications Security Bureau, which also collects and analyses foreign signals intelligence and provides security services to maintain the confidentiality of official information and data stored on public service computers. A spokesman for the Prime Minister, who is on a four-day trip to South Pacific countries, said John Key knew General Alexander was in the country. But the spokesman said he had nothing more to add as the Prime Minister did not comment on security matters.

Ummmm – hello? Why the hell is the head of the bloody NSA – one of the largest and most secretive intelligence agencies in America doing in NZ while John Key is out of the country during a massive cyber attacks on the US? Keith Alexander doesn’t ‘go’ to see people, people ‘go’ and see him, sometimes willingly, sometimes in the back of a private CIA rendition corporate jet on route to a secret CIA torture prison in Eastern Europe. Folks, this stinks to high heaven, remember the 50th Birthday Party of the SIS in 2006 when all the heads of the Intelligence community of the West visited the SIS for their birthday? Remember how that was an unbelievable bullshit cover story, why the hell would the head of the CIA, Australian SIS, Australian SIO, the Canadian SIS, MI6 AND MI5 visit our piss weedy Secret Intelligence Service to celebrate 50 years of abusive state spying on the sex lives of the Green Party?

This is doge-o-rama, we operate the echelon spy network out of the Waihopai spybase for the bloody American’s that allows them to intercept and spy on every electronically transmitted communication sent in this part of the world. Why would someone as unbelievably powerful as Keith Alexander be here if he wasn’t meeting the PM during such a massive cyber attack on America? Something is so way up with this story, who is doing any digging on it?

And while we are at it, the cyber attack on the US, which is being ‘blamed’ on North Korea. How come North Korea has faster dial up speeds to launch an attack like this than bloody NZ has? Shouldn’t we be concerned North Korea has faster internet than we do?

nz blogosphere rankings : May survey release

Full list rankings have been released for the nz blogosphere May 2009 survey. There are 218 blogs currently on the list - the most ever.

Traffic was up a bit in the afterwash of the Veitch case, the cranking up of the Mt Albert by-election and the budget. Comments were also up over the 20 mark for many blogs. After last year's election a number of bloggers quit (some to join the new government) but there seems to be a momentum six months or so after that game-changing event that has increased interest in blogging and reinforced growing audience numbers. Some very fine blogs have debuted in the rankings for May.

The June survey is underway now - please send your blog stats (preferably with a screen grab or image of the unique visitor numbers) to:
editor (at) tumeke.org.

Thanks to all the bloggers participating. To assure those bloggers who are perhaps reticent: I have never, nor will I ever, email bloggers to demand their stats or send reminders out via email. The only notifications or nags anyone will receive is a general one via a post, like this. Once your blog traffic has been verified it will stay at that level for a month or so before being gradually reduced (as an estimate) if you do not send in your traffic. This is a method of incentivising disclosure of traffic without getting into the awkwardness and bureaucracy of hassling large numbers of often busy people for details they may consider trivial. Please also note the privacy provisions relating to the safeguarding of anonymous/pseudonymous authors at the end of the list: if you have not identified yourself publicly as the author your real name will not be listed.

Please put the url of any blogs that should be on the list in the comments section so they can be assessed for June. For example:
http://bkdrinkwater.blogspot.com/

ACT are out of step with the rest of the developed world

World powers accept warming limit
Developed and developing nations have agreed that global temperatures should not rise more than 2C above 1900 levels, a G8 summit declaration says.
That is the level above which, the UN says, the Earth's climate system would become dangerously unstable. US President Barack Obama said the countries had made important strides in dealing with climate change. But the G8 failed to persuade developing countries to accept targets of cutting emissions by 50% by 2050. On Wednesday, the G8 agreed its own members would work towards 80% cuts by the same date.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said the G8 had not done enough and should also set 2020 targets. He said that while the G8's Wednesday agreement was welcome, its leaders also needed to establish a strong and ambitious mid-term target for emissions cuts.

ACT, the political party who are the tail owning the dog in its relationship with National are on record as saying that a 2 degree rise in temperature would be ‘beneficial’ for NZ and that C02 is a ‘misunderstood nutrient’. Environmentalists call C02 ‘pollution’, ACT calls it ‘life’, beyond the climate deniers like dear old Ian Wishart and ACT and the oil sponsored spin groups trying to pollute the debate with quack science, the rest of the scientific community are demanding changes before 2020 because a 2degree rise would put the entire planet in danger of breaching feedback loops that could end civilization as we know it with catastrophic abrupt climate change.

ACT’s influence over the Government is happening because of an intellectual vacuum within National – in short National don’t know what it is they actually stand for. They were social conservatives, that failed. They were free marketers, that failed. They were racially divisive, that failed. As National try to reestablish exactly what it is they believe in, that philosophical vacuum is being exploited by ACT, to have a party seriously claim that a 2 degree rise would be all roses and gold for NZ is so bankrupt that it is farcical.

Dr Nick Smith claimed this week at the climate change meeting that we had to sell India coal because if we weren’t India’s dealer for an 18th century filthy energy source then someone else would be. That type of thinking and lack of ethics to pursue trade deals is the exact type of mindset that has put us in this position in the first place.

As the G8 weakly reach for a new arrangement after a decade of lip service we the people need to be the ones who force the change.

2020 is a date that demands solutions, it is interesting that the Pentagon had a very clear idea as to what would happen 11 years from now in 2004…

Now the Pentagon tells Bush: climate change will destroy us
Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters..

A secret report, suppressed by US defence chiefs and obtained by The Observer, warns that major European cities will be sunk beneath rising seas as Britain is plunged into a 'Siberian' climate by 2020. Nuclear conflict, mega-droughts, famine and widespread rioting will erupt across the world.

The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy as countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food, water and energy supplies. The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say the few experts privy to its contents.

'Disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life,' concludes the Pentagon analysis. 'Once again, warfare would define human life.'

The findings will prove humiliating to the Bush administration, which has repeatedly denied that climate change even exists. Experts said that they will also make unsettling reading for a President who has insisted national defence is a priority.

The report was commissioned by influential Pentagon defence adviser Andrew Marshall, who has held considerable sway on US military thinking over the past three decades. He was the man behind a sweeping recent review aimed at transforming the American military under Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

Climate change 'should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a US national security concern', say the authors, Peter Schwartz, CIA consultant and former head of planning at Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and Doug Randall of the California-based Global Business Network.

An imminent scenario of catastrophic climate change is 'plausible and would challenge United States national security in ways that should be considered immediately', they conclude. As early as next year widespread flooding by a rise in sea levels will create major upheaval for millions.

Treating migrants as second class citizens

Migrant groups push to end 'hypocrisy'
Migrant support groups will today ask the Government to stop letting migrant workers into New Zealand "knowing full well there are no jobs for them", and to commit to helping those already here and grappling with unemployment. Immigration Minister Jonathan Coleman will be urged at a meeting this morning to do something about the plight of workers who have lost their jobs in the recession. A position paper, representing the views of about 200 people who attended a public forum in May, will also be presented to the minister, Migrant Action Trust spokeswoman Agnes Granada said. The other groups meeting the minister will include representatives from employers of migrant workers and Migrante Aotearoa, a migrant workers union. Ms Granada said her group was approached by five new migrants from India and the Philippines yesterday seeking help to find work - with three of them arriving a fortnight ago. "It is totally hypocritical that Immigration continues to freely issue new work-to-residence visas, while at the same time telling migrant workers already here they cannot renew their work permits because the jobs are meant for Kiwis," Ms Granada said. "It is unfair for New Zealand to continue taking new money from new migrants knowing there are no jobs for them here, and then telling them to get out when they have run out of money."

Thank god a reporter as wise and intelligent as Lincoln Tan is bringing this issue up. It really does seem to be the height of hypocrisy that we are still letting in so many migrants with the promise of work when we are about to considerably increase our unemployment rate and are actively culling those migrant workers currently here to give ‘kiwis’ jobs. We are mistreating these migrants the way NZ seems to have always mistreated migrants, we did it to Pacific Islanders when we needed manual labour and then suddenly didn’t, we did it to Asians when we needed their cash and then suddenly didn’t and we seem to be doing it now with everyone.

nACTional have a mass immigration plan to create dumb cheap ‘growth’ (one of the hidden drivers behind the Super City privatization blueprint) that isn’t being upfront with the reality of the unemployment situation that will cause deep cultural friction.

I don’t think we do enough to help migrants integrate into NZ society as it is. We don’t provide universal cultural classes for migrants to help them understand what the cultural norms of NZ society are and we don’t provide enough resources for the increased pressures on the infrastructure sudden immigration causes. This leads to resentment from the host culture and alienation of the migrant culture, I’m all for growth and a multi cultural society, but it requires resources to help integrate and resources to build the infrastructure. Those resources have to be provided up front and require real political leadership rather than open the floodgates and just hope for the best. That option doesn’t help migrants or host cultures.

nACTional’s plan for the unemployed? A prison built from shipping containers

More people need top-up to survive on welfare cash
The number of people getting extra support from Work and Income has jumped by a third as New Zealanders struggle with recession and rising living costs. Figures obtained by the Council of Christian Social Services show that the numbers receiving either "temporary additional support" or "special benefit" jumped from 40,748 in the first quarter of last year to 54,389 in the same period this year. Both kinds of help are for people who can't meet ongoing commitments on their homes, cars and other specified items even after accessing all other entitlements such as main benefits and accommodation allowances. As a proportion of working-aged people on main benefits, those getting extra help rose from 15.9 per cent to 18.8 per cent. Wellington People's Centre benefit rights co-ordinator Kay Brereton said many of those seeking extra help could not keep up payments on loans and mortgages after losing their jobs. "Others are simply facing harder economic times - things like increases in power and petrol, most of which doesn't get covered in temporary additional support but some of the flow-on costs sometimes can," she said. The Council of Christian Social Services, which requested the figures under the Official Information Act for the first of what it says will be quarterly "vulnerability reports" on social indicators, said it expected even more dramatic increases in extra benefits in its next report.

It’s getting a lot colder out there isn’t it? Despite all the claims of ‘green shoots’ the reality for many is that life is becoming increasingly more difficult and those hitting the welfare lines are finding out for the first time that the myth of the bludger gaining massive amounts of free money from the state is exactly that, a myth. The means testing of the newly middle class unemployed is creating a real wake up call at how little assistance the state actually provides for those on the bottom of the heap. If this is how tight it is at 5% unemployment, how bad do you think it will get when we hit Treasury’s worst case scenario of 10% unemployment, because the only actual solution nACTional have come up with for the unemployed, is to build new prisons out of shipping containers.

Imagine how all those new prisoners who are committing crime for the first time out of need not greed will get treated inside? We are building the blocks of a terrible empire of suffering, the poisoned wound of which will gag society as a whole.

I hope John Key on his taxpayer funded pacific hip hop tour starts to think about solutions needed back in NZ soon, because his country needs it.

Eye to Eye a grave loss for current affairs in NZ

Media: No longer seeing Eye to Eye
Willie Jackson claims there is "no room for opinionated Maori" at TVNZ after the state broadcaster scrapped his current affairs show Eye to Eye. "If you want to be a Maori presenter at TVNZ you have to be apolitical but it is a different rule if you are...Paul Holmes or Paul Henry," Jackson said. "I just think rules are different for people like myself and [outspoken former Maori broadcaster] Derek Fox." TVNZ won widespread plaudits for Eye to Eye with Jackson chairing a confrontation between four guests, often with two pairs representing Maori and Pakeha interests. But the state broadcaster has pulled the plug amid funding changes. These meant it had to start contributing cash and ramp the programme up for prime time if it was to attract any public money. Jackson was grateful Eye to Eye had run for six years and said he was not wholly surprised. But he was disappointed about TVNZ's approach. The production company Front Of The Box had been told in an email. After being treated as a valuable talent at TVNZ, Jackson said he had been unable to discuss other work with the broadcaster. "I've tried to talk to [head of news and current affairs Anthony] Flannery, but he stopped answering my phone calls and emails about a year ago."

OUCH! Eye to Eye has been killed off by TVNZ? This isn’t just a loss to Maori content in NZ, it is a massive loss to current affairs in NZ. As far as I am concerned, Willie Jackson is one of the best current affairs hosts in the country, Eye to Eye was always confrontational to the issues in a way the pussy footed rest of the current affairs community never was.

I take Willie’s point on the double standards in NZ media with his Paul Henry example. There seems to be a belief in NZ media that no one is allowed a ‘left wing’ opinion. I remember hosting a talkback show on a radio station some years ago, I had a collection of guests on the show that ranged from Greenpeace to a tenants rights group. I was asked after my show to see the director who said he felt I was ‘too political’ for the stations format, the joke however was that immediately before my show, right wing maniac Lindsey Perigo had hosted a 3 hour interview with Don Brash as his guest, and that wasn’t considered ‘too political’. There is a right wing bias in our NZ media that holds a double standard, former National Party candidate Paul Henry’s crazy right wing diatribes are considered ‘mainstream dialogue’ anything progressively liberal is considered too fringe.

To the amazingly talented people who created one of the best current affairs shows in the country for the last 6 years – kia kaha and many thanks for the thoughtful and challenging insights you brought to the country. The NZ media landscape minus Eye to Eye is a greatly reduced and inferior one and heralds the on going bias towards the right.

The Miseducation of Anne Tolley

Minister defends funding
Many private schools are struggling in the recession and "deserve to have some support from the taxpayer", Education Minister Anne Tolley says. Figures obtained by The Press show that on average, one private school a month has voluntarily closed in the past 15 months. Officials and sector leaders say more private schools are about to fold or apply to integrate into the state system. Tolley told The Press there was "no doubt" private schools faced difficult times. That was part of the reason why the Government had kept its promise of $35 million for private schools over the next four years.

As if tax cuts for the rich weren’t enough, National are helping their rich friends yet again. Ronald McDonald’s Girlfriend and Miseducation Minister, Anne Tolley, who forced junk food back into schools because it was ‘politically correct’ not to serve unhealthy food to our children, the woman who is currently trying to slide a pointless league system by stealth through Primary Schools to create a false competition model is also handing out taxpayer money to the Private Education industry. Now if you are rich enough to alienate your child by having them raised by a private school while you swan around as a master of the universe, then surely you should pay the bloody private school fees of that choice you have made, why the hell should we the taxpayer be called upon to bail these rich pricks out? If Mummy and Daddy are having a hard time in the recession, welcome to the real world, send your precious bundle of joy to the state school you currently fund through general taxation, calling on Taxpayers to subsidize your private education that you choose over the state education is a luxury that NZ simply can’t afford.

Are ‘green shoots’ really just snot?

IMF sees slow recovery
The global economy is set to slowly pull out from its worst recession in six decades, the IMF said, and world leaders aim to help the recovery with a breakthrough in stalled trade talks. The International Monetary Fund forecast a slightly steeper 1.4 percent global contraction in its latest outlook than in the previous April edition, but saw 2.5 percent growth next year, stronger than the 1.9 percent predicted earlier. The Fund warned, however, that the world economy and the banking sector at the heart of the financial crisis were not strong enough yet to do without heavy government spending and cheap central bank funds. "The recovery is coming but it is likely to be a weak recovery," IMF chief economist Olivier Blanchard said. Leaders of the Group of Eight industrial nations agreed that despite rounds of interest rate cuts and an estimated $5 trillion in public spending, the recovery was not yet assured and that it was too early to cut off economic lifelines.

Isn’t this upgrade from the IMF more to do with the impact of Government’s mass stimulus packages? The final shot of steroids into a pumped up roid rage global economic system deformed by unregulated financial weapons of mass destruction that took venal greed to un unknown level of corruption. What happens when the Government’s can’t fork out any more cash to repair the damage? Unregulated greed signed up $67 Trillion in Credit Default Swaps, Obama has sunk in a Trillion and there is now talk of a second stimulus bailout because the roid rage global economy is screaming for another hit like a crack addict needing his next fix. How will mass global unemployment effect these ‘green shoots’ is something that still hasn’t been answered, and neither has the actual vision of what we are trying to get back up and running. Surely we all agree that consumer culture was allowed to blow out to a level utterly unsustainable not only for the environment but for capitalism itself and trying to restart this deformed system to get back to ‘business’ as usual’ is just the height of madness.

The news ain’t getting better and I view claims that this is just a ‘recession’ from those with a vested interest in calming the markets and consumers akin to Real Estate Agents telling passengers on the Titanic that it’s never been a better time to buy deck chairs.

Retail sales knocked
New Zealand's retailers suffered a big setback in June after seeing some encouraging signs earlier in the year. Monthly electronic card transactions figures released by Statistics New Zealand today show that core retail spending (excluding automotive industries and fuel) went backwards by 1.2 percent last month, following rises in the previous three months - including a 1.1 percent increase in May. The fall was the biggest monthly drop in the core retail sales figures since October 2007. SNZ said that the durables industry, including furniture, hardware and appliance retailing, was the main contributor.

UK business lobby warns of double-dip recession
LONDON - There is a rising danger that Britain is about to enter a "double dip" or "W-shaped" recession, according to the latest survey of business confidence by the British Chambers of Commerce. The BCC's second-quarter survey confirms the current consensus on the economy - that "the worst of the recession is over" - but says that employers' hiring intentions are running at a 20-year low and warns of "serious downward pressures". "There is a risk that without a continued focus on limiting the impact of recession, the economy could drop off suddenly, adding weight to the argument that we are heading towards a W-shaped recession."

Aussie jobless hits 5.8pc
Australia's unemployment rate has jumped again as the slowing economy forces more companies to wipe employees from payrolls. The official jobless rate rose to 5.8 percent in June, after hitting 5.7 percent in May, with 21,400 jobs lost overall, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported. That's the highest unemployment rate since October 2003. Crucially, the decline in jobs fell mostly on full-time employees, with 21,900 such positions lost last month. The number of part-time employees rose by about 400.

Worst for 20 years
Investors are bracing themselves for the worst Australian profit season in nearly two decades, with earnings set to fall sharply and dividends still under pressure as corporate Australia takes a buffeting from the global economic crisis. Analysts expect profits to be up to 20 percent lower than last year with few prospects for growth in the next 12 months.

Waves of job losses sap U.S. states' budgets
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Already sapped by a long U.S. recession, states' budgets will likely shrivel even more as waves of Americans lose their jobs, and the damage done to public services such as education could last for years. Looking at the U.S. unemployment rate, which stands at 9.5 percent and is projected to rise above 10 percent, National Governors Association Executive Director Raymond Scheppach said states' economic conditions are going to "get worse in about 10 months, and it'll stay bad for a while."

'Massive' increase in non-payers
A "staggering increase" in the number of firms not paying their bills in the first half of the year has prompted credit bureau Veda Advantage to warn businesses of a deterioration in the next 18 months. Veda said it saw a "massive" 64.56 per cent rise in commercial defaults in the six months to June compared with a year ago. Defaults are essentially where the business owed money has given up and turned to a debt collection company which then informs a credit bureau like Veda.
Expat dole figures monitored
The Social Development Ministry is monitoring how many Kiwis return from overseas and go straight on the dole amid concerns it could worsen gloomy unemployment forecasts.

I’ve said many times that our unemployment rate will be the worst case scenario that Treasury picked because the Government have done sweet FA to turn the jobless numbers around (1000 NZers on the dole each week) and because expat NZers would flee the global economy by rushing home, bloating jobless numbers.

We are in denial at how bad the economy really is and can’t seem to agree on what the global economic values should now be based on, rampant consumerism has almost killed the planet and the economy, restarting that rampant consumerism can’t be the solution.

Oh and a great piece in Vanity Fair about AIG and the corruption that started this entire meltdown…

The Man Who Crashed the World
Almost a year after A.I.G.'s collapse, despite a tidal wave of outrage, there still has been no clear explanation of what toppled the insurance giant. The author decides to ask the people involved-the silent, shell-shocked traders of the A.I.G. Financial Products unit-and finds that the story may have a villain, whose reign of terror over 400 employees brought the company, the U.S. economy, and the global financial system to their knees.

In short, we are in no way out of the woods yet and the ‘green shoots’ are really just the drying snot from a very sick global economy.

Fag had it coming – another ‘provocation’ defense

Victim's family condemn 'archaic' law
The family of a man who was bashed to death with a banjo have angrily condemned the provocation law that allows a partial defence of murder after his killer was found guilty of manslaughter last night. Ferdinand Ambach, a 31-year-old dive master from Hungary, had been accused of murdering Ronald James Brown, 69, after the pair got into a violent argument at Mr Brown's Onehunga flat on December 7, 2007. He claims that Mr Brown, who was gay, made unwanted sexual advances towards him. During the trial in the High Court at Auckland, his lawyer, Peter Kaye, raised the possibility Mr Brown may have attempted to rape Ambach which triggered "a monstrous rage" where the tourist temporarily lost his self-control. After three and a half days of deliberations, the verdict was delivered at 6.45pm. When Ambach was found not guilty of murder, but guilty of manslaughter, there were gasps from Mr Brown's friends and family in the public gallery. Ambach was expressionless as he was remanded in custody until sentencing. Mr Brown's niece Tracy Evans told the Herald her family were "deeply disgusted with the verdict". She said the [provocation] law was "archaic" and had allowed a murderer to receive a reduced sentence for a "horrific crime". "It's a sad indictment on our legal system that the defence can completely fabricate a case and slander a good man's character in an attempt to defend a murderer." Ms Evans said the police efforts had been outstanding. Detective Inspector Greg Cramer, who led the police inquiry, said the defence's rape suggestion was "spurious". "While Mr Kaye made the point, it was circumstantial [and] it was drawing a very large bow to suggest that had been attempted." Mr Brown was found at the bottom of the stairs in his flat, covered in bits of furniture, and with a broken banjo sticking out of his mouth. He had been bashed with the instrument at least five times.

This killer tourist had rammed the bango down Ronald James Brown’s throat after bashing him 5 times with it in an act of provoked ‘hetero-rage’. It’s a provocation defense that we are all currently heaping bitter resentment on Clayton Weatherston for, but it is used time and time and time again in this country to reduce murder to manslaughter because the mere idea of a gay man hitting on a straight man is apparently such a terrifying concept for a heterosexual that it gives a heterosexual every excuse to kill a queer. If every woman killed every man for unwanted sexual advances, we wouldn’t have any males left in NZ, yet somehow in this day and age a defence can be mounted that a heterosexual can be so provoked by a homosexual that killing them is actually defendable.

Robert Hunt was killed by Dick Faisauvale in 2004 in a fit of hetero-rage and won provocation, so did Phillip Edwards in 2003 against David McNee. We seem to allow the murder of gay men to be reduced to manslaughter based on this ridiculous concept that the idea of a gay man wanting sex with a straight man so frightening for the straight man it defends him lashing out and killing. I’ve been hit on by men, I’m not gay, it’s one of those moments when you shrug and say, “not my thing bruv”, I never suddenly felt compelled to murder because the situation ‘freaked me out’.

This verdict, like the ones before it, legitimizes this legal homophobia and reduces our society to one where irrational hate becomes a defense. 'Gay panic' to justify homophobic violence and legally being able to get away with it suggests an Institutionalized bigotry that is unacceptable in a modern society.

Warning about Tax-refunds

They are selling themselves as a way to get money back from the tax man again, and each season they do we like to remind Tumeke readers not to trust the buggers. What Taxrefunds don’t tell you is that if you owe money to IRD, they tip IRD off to this fact and you suddenly have IRD chasing you. We’ve even had Geoff from Tax Refunds threaten me personally on this site about saying such things. It was shortly after Geoff’s threat that IRD started calling me. They sell themselves as an easy way to make money from your tax refunds, what they don’t tell you is that if you owe IRD money, they tip IRD off to this.

Don’t trust the buggers.

Human sperm: which doctors

That story about mice - the deformed mice that humans had created and that nature had to kill - was three years ago. Today a claim human sperm have been created in a lab will be hailed as some sort of a wonderful miracle breakthrough and cure by the NZ media. It's horrifying is what it is. As horrifying as the woman who wanted a few extra years to live to play bridge so she went to China and had aborted embryos injected into her head and was hailed by the media in this country as a brave soul undergoing a medical marvel. It's that sort of horrifying. To a culture brought up on sci-fi and undergoing later-age reproductive pressure due to career and debt it's just science. It's medical science and therefore it must be good. All research is good research so the logic goes.

The reason why the sperm count of humans has halved over the last half century (the claim on today's One midday news) is to reduce the population to a sustainable level. Isn't that the natural answer? Humans themselves would draw that conclusion of any other animal they were studying. Then again only humans are capable of the hubris that would render the thought of any natural limitation simply a matter for their own genius to solve in short order.

So when they say the answer to stopping the World's population growing beyond any possibility to cope is to ensure that the wealthy and the elites will perpetuate themselves by unnatural means - to be offered a "treatment" in the words of the scientists for their natural infertility (or at least infertility caused by humans themselves) - then we need to think why this is necessary or desirable now that the freaks have established that it can (or could) be done. It's a dreadful spectre. Doctors should stick to delivering babies - not creating them.Embryonic stem cells are the major issue for the lab boys. Why? Why not other stem cells? They don't want to focus on stem cells - that's what the public don't seem to understand - it's the embryo that they are after. That's why they will always fight for the ability to retain all embryos, sperm and reproductive matter for as long as possible. They will find whatever excuse they can to hold onto the embryonic matter. This all has ethics approval... naturally.

Bomber's Blog - the war on news ON TONIGHT!

Bomber's Blog - the war on news is on tonight, 9.15pm sky 89, Freeview 21 and Triangle. It will be posted on Tumeke Sunday.

Jetstar just don't get it

Jetstar accuses Air New Zealand of sabotaging Kiwi launch
We've experienced some tough competition before but we've never experienced someone trying to sabotage our business, or specifically go after us to try and discredit us.
Jetstar CEO Bruce Buchanan
A slanging match has broken out between Jetstar and Air New Zealand after the Australian airline claimed its troubled Kiwi launch had been sabotaged by dirty tricks.

Claims this week by Australian budgie airline Jetstar by their chief executive Bruce Buchanan, that Air NZ have sabotaged Jet Star’s launch with rumours that Jetstar’s planes are old and pilots poorly trained.

Ummm, no Bruce, Air NZ haven’t sabotaged your airlines launch, you’ve sabotaged your airlines launch by over booking planes, selecting older passengers over younger passengers while waiting in line (who might create more of a media fuss for being bumped) and hiring stupid and rude staff who treat passengers like cattle. You Bruce have sabotaged your airlines launch by then patronizingly and with a certain Australian arrogance it must be said, told NZers that they need to be ‘educated’ on when to turn up for a Jetstar flight.

Blaming Air NZ for your self inflicted media cock up is just adding ‘whiny’ to a long list of words to described your poor serviced budget truck-to –the-abattoir-is-more-comfortable-than-you-are airline.

nz blogosphere rankings : May 2009 summary

NZ blogosphere May 2009 survey will be released tomorrow (Thursday) - this is the summary. The only thing expanding in this recession seems to be the NZ blogosphere : traffic is up, blog numbers are up. Maybe it's all the newly unemployed starting blogs? There were more comments in May than any month I can remember due in part to the inclusion of some new blogs - six of them appearing in the top 100. Cactus Kate declared her traffic after drifting down the rankings - that was the major change for the top 20. June survey is now underway - see note at end of post.

Changes from last month (April) in brackets.

Top 100:

[new] this survey:
#28 (new) Red Alert : www.blog.labour.org.nz
05/2009+ "Labour MPs on issues that we care about"

#33 (new) Being Frank : www.beingfrank.co.nz
07/2006+ "Seven 20-something New Zealand Catholics"

#48 (new) Sustain:if:able Kiwi : www.emergentkiwi.org.nz
11/2003+ "seeking a sustain-if-able spirituality with God/self/people/place/culture"

#51 (new) Editing the Herald : www.editingtheherald.blogspot.com
01/2009+ "Inventing and perpetuating news-rage journalism"

#61 (new) Life and Politics : www.lifeandpolitics.wordpress.com
04/2009+ "Occasional comment on politics and the media in New Zealand"

#80 (new) And Slaters Go Plop : www.damian.peterson.net.nz
03/2007+ "The Bloggery"

[+] significant ranking moves up:
#6 (+3) Dim Post
#9 (+11) Cactus Kate
#19 (+4) Offsetting Behaviour
#20 (+7) Poneke’s Weblog : www.poneke.wordpress.com
#39 (+18) Hitting Metal With A Hammer
#49 (+15) TBR.cc (The Briefing Room)
#59 (+10) G.blog
#79 (+19) Brian Edwards Media

[-] significant ranking moves down:
#18 (-4) The Visible Hand in Economics
#24 (-6) In a strange land
#26 (-7) Open Parachute
#35 (-9) MandM
#40 (-11) The Persuader
#44 (-11) Radical cross stitch
#55 (-16) Capitalism bad, Tree pretty
#64 (-11) Kotare | The strategist
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#81 (-11) Aotearoa: a wider perspective
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#90 (-12) Ideologically Impure
#93 (-17) Kiwi Polemicist
#98 (-39) Media Fetish

[Posts] Average per week:
140 (-) Whoar
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55 (n/a) Inquiring Mind
50 (+15) Home Paddock
45 (+5) Standard
35 (+5) TUMEKE!
35 (+5) Keeping Stock
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30 (-5) No Minister
30 (-) Not PC
30 (+5) No Right Turn
30 (+5) Hand Mirror
20 (-10) Roar Prawn
20 (n/a) Frogblog
20 (new) Red Alert

[Comments] Average highest post per week:
510 (+55) Public Address
185 (+40) Frogblog
165 (-20) Kiwiblog
105 (+10) Standard
75 (new) Being Frank
60 (n/a) TBR.cc
55 (+20) Dim Post
45 (n/a) Not PC
40 (+10) Hand Mirror
40 (+5) NZ Conservative
40 (new) Red Alert
35 (new) Editing the Herald
35 (-) Kiwipolitico
30 (+5) TUMEKE!
30 (+5) Cactus Kate
30 (-) TVHE
30 (-) Whaleoil
30 (+5) No Minister
25 (-30) Open Parachute
25 (-10) Hot Topic
25 (-5) In a Stranage Land
25 (+5) Reading the Maps
20 (n/a) New Zeal
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20 (n/a) Workers Party
20 (n/a) Brian Edwards Media
20 (-40) MandM
20 (n/a) Object Dart

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Thanks to all those bloggers who have sent in their stats (editor (at) tumeke.org) and to those about to send them in for June.

Mate you sliced her ears off you psycho 2

I killed her, Weatherston told officer at scene
"I killed her," Clayton Weatherston said as he stood over Sophie Elliott's bloodied body, a jury has been told. The High Court in Christchurch heard yesterday that Weatherston admitted stabbing his former girlfriend with a knife, and using scissors "at the end". Constable John Cunningham was the first officer at the scene on January 9 last year after Elliott was killed in the bedroom of her Dunedin home. Weatherston admits manslaughter but denies murder, saying he was provoked.

I just can’t get enough of my favorite South Island psycho pin up boy, Clayton Weatherston. I’m just so offended on so many different levels that he’s trying to use provocation as a defence.

In my headspace, I accept that people can flip out and do awful things. That’s no justification of their actions, just an acceptance of human nature. My thinking is that if that moment occurs for you, you have a responsibility to man up and acknowledge the damage you’ve caused, take your punishment and work the rest of your life for redemption. I could have accepted if Weatherston’s defence was insanity, but PROVOCATION? He’s effectively saying Sophie was ‘asking’ for it, that she in some way ‘deserved’ being stabbed 216 times, have her ears sliced off and genitalia mutilated! The audacity and arrogance of this guy is absolutely astounding and I really want to see his face when the verdict is read out if he's found to be guilty of murder.

What’s the bet Mr Emotionless burst into tears if his fantasy self-justification gets so roundly discredited?

No more NZ involvement in Afghanistan!

US wants increased NZ presence in Afghanistan
The United States is constantly asking New Zealand to increase its military presence in Afghanistan, papers show. About 140 army, navy and air force personnel are involved in New Zealand's Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) operating in Afghanistan's Bamyan Province. The team has been active there since 2003. The Government is considering whether to send Special Air Service troops back to the country; the SAS has been deployed there three times, the last in 2006. Radio New Zealand today reported papers obtained under the Official Information Act showed the United States was impressed with the PRT and regularly asked for an increased commitment in Afghanistan.

NO! NO! NO! A country so warped by US policy that funded the very Islamist fundamentalists in the 1980s who ended up ripping the country asunder, a country that the CIA fostered heroin production to pay for a multitude of dirty wars, a country that has now been flooded by Blackwater mercenaries who butcher without judicial oversight and who expand a dangerous destruction of national sovereignty while making billions in war money for their evangelical Christian masters!

NO MORE NZ INVOLVEMENT IN THIS FILTH! We are not protecting freedom and democracy, we are propping up American hegemony.

Don’t we commemorate ANZAC Day to tell the next generation of NZers that we will never throw away NZ lives as pointlessly and wastefully as we have done in the past for wars that had nothing to do with freedom or democracy? Have we learnt nothing from our history?

I’m sure Willie Apiata is a decent and brave bloke, but handing out medals to a war we shouldn’t be part of isn’t brave or courageous, it’s the usual flag blinding patriotism that keeps people from asking real questions like “what the hell are we doing in Afghanistan”. We are merely pawns in a vast game played by people with no ethics or morality and our continued presence is simply window dressing for a corrupt consensus.

We are fooling ourselves as badly as Robert Macnamara did with the Vietnam war to pretend we are fighting for freedom and democracy.

At least Macnamara had the grace to acknowledge he was wrong before he died.

U.N. report: Civilian casualties hit record high in Afghan conflict
KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- The number of civilians killed in armed conflict in Afghanistan rose 40 percent last year, to a record 2,118, a U.N. report said Tuesday.

The Gunner's Lament

A Maori gunner lay dying
In a paddyfield north of Saigon,
And he said to his pakeha cobber,
"I reckon I've had it, man!

'And if I could fly like a bird
To my old granny's whare
A truck and a winch would never drag
Me back to the Army.

'A coat and a cap and a well-paid job
Looked better than shovelling metal,
And they told me that Te Rauparaha
Would have fought in the Vietnam battle.

'On my last leave the town swung round
Like a bucket full of eels.
The girls liked the uniform
And I liked the girls.

'Like a bullock to the abattoirs
In the name of liberty
They flew me with a hangover
Across the Tasman Sea,

'And what I found in Vietnam
Was mud and blood and fire,
With the Yanks and the Reds taking turns
At murdering the poor.

'And I saw the reason for it
In a Viet Cong's blazing eyes -
We fought for the crops of kumara
And they are fighting for the rice.

'So go tell my sweetheart
To get another boy
Who'll cuddle her and marry her
And laugh when the bugles blow,

'And tell my youngest brother
He can have my shotgun
To fire at the ducks on the big lagoon,
But not to aim it at a man,

'And tell my granny to wear black
And carry a willow leaf,
Because the kid she kept from the cold
Has eaten a dead man's loaf.

'And go and tell Keith Holyoake
Sitting in Wellington,
However long he scrubs his hands
He'll never get them clean.'

James K Baxter
1965

NZ out of Afghanistan now!

Michael Jackson Funeral

WHAT? No 'Man in the Mirror' rendition at the Michael Jackson funeral except a shitty instrumental? I'd want my ticket back!

‘Green shoots’ are a false dawn

Better sentiment 'not new dawn'
Businesses are leaner, more resilient and eager for good news but "the new dawn" of economic recovery is still far away and vulnerable to further international crises, economists say. A mildly improved quarterly survey of business opinion from the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research heralded a lurch back from historically poor business sentiment. Business New Zealand chief executive Phil O'Reilly was hesitant to confirm the worst had passed, speculating that there could be some "bouncing along the bottom" yet. "There is a lot in the international community that could get in the way of New Zealand's economic growth and cause us to fall back over again."

Here’s my beef, what would we consider a ‘win’ here? For far too long the West have fuelled a consumer culture that is utterly unsustainable, and by 2050 the global population is expected to double. The West borrowed vast sums from the developing world to pay for Bush’s war in Iraq and to slosh cheap money into the credit markets. Money from the developing world was blown on a western lifestyle of SUV’s, plasma TVs and cosmetic surgery all paid for on credit cards, in America financial weapons of mass destruction in the uber-unregulated economy allowed for banks to create fairy tale Credit Default Swaps that still have $62 Trillion in Enron-esq financial transactions still hidden off the books. This meltdown was fuelled in America with the AAA rated sub prime mortgage fiasco where most of those given this cheap money America had been flooded with were given that money under equations that Former Fed Boss, Alan Greenspan confessed couldn’t understand. People were given money on the flawed belief that property prices would continue to increase by 6% every year forever and ever.

So a vast bubble built on naked and venal greed has been popped but the very eco-system that has been raped and plundered for these consumer excesses have created a toll on the environment that now threatens to bend the ability of the climate to sustain our civilization.

So what exactly is our ‘win’ here? Governments have pumped massive amounts of money into the economy to try and get consumers to start spending again, because our growth is rated purely on expansion and consumption, but that’s akin to a crack addict needing another hit when the crack addict can’t take one more hit.

The false dawn of green shoots should not eclipse the reality that we have pushed our luck within a planet of finite resources. Our ability to ruthlessly exploit our natural resources for a wasteful consumer culture that is utterly unsustainable is a challenge that goes well beyond Government’s getting consumers back into spending to restart the very system that has brought us to the brink.

Trying to answer some of those questions was the point of the Government’s climate action meeting last night in Auckland at the Hyatt. The Government’s Dr Nick Smith made a presentation to a packed meeting, but to give Auckland, a city of over a million 90minutes to ‘hear’ what Aucklanders had to say about climate change in itself was a suggestion of how much this tour was simply spin rather than consultation.

I have to admit feeling a certain sympathy for Dr Smith. He is a man who from his presentation shows he understands how difficult climate change is, he accepts the science and understands the science and he is as ‘liberal’ as National gets but as Dr Smith listed through the Government’s environmental ‘achievements’ I couldn’t help but think how pitiful they were. The $700 million tax rebate for research in our Agricultural sector could have been a massive spring board for the science needed to come up with solutions for our largest sectors emissions, but National shut that down and blew it all on tax cuts for the rich.

Speakers on the night pointed to issues on soil and organic techniques that could reduce our carbon footprint and a large majority called on a 40% reduction target for our emissions by 2020.

As part of the open mike question format I asked Dr Smith a question.

“Thank you for coming along tonight Dr Smith and talking to us on an issue many here are passionate about, but with all due respect, how can anyone in this room take your Government seriously on the subject of climate change when within your Government is ACT who have said a 2degree rise in global temperatures would be ‘beneficial’ to NZ and that C02 is a misunderstood nutrient. How will you marginalize ACT?”

Dr Smith smiled a tight thin lipped smile and said that with a Parliament of 120 there were many viewpoints. I cut him off,

“But this goes to your credibility as a Government on this issue, you are in Government with a party who effectively believe global warming is a hoax, how will you marginalize ACT”.

Dr Smith tried to suggest that National were a minority Government, but the crowd laughed him down because pretending that National and ACT aren’t in bed together wasn’t an issue the crowd were going to let Dr Smith try and get away with. The point was made, this Government’s credibility on climate change IS compromised by the ACT party and for Dr Smith’s efforts to go beyond greenwash he must show the Government is serious about climate change with proposals that can do something Labour never seemed able to do in 9 years as Government, to stand up to big industry and force them to change. Seeing though that this week the Government handed water standards over to the Dairy Industry, the biggest polluter of water ways in NZ, those hopes of standing up to big business have quickly faded away already.

As one speaker on the night said, “Thank you for coming and showing me that you can’t or won’t make the changes necessary, that it is in fact up to us to force those changes.”