Since Peter Williams left TV One in December 2018 its News bulletins have been effectively Jacinda Government News, guaranteed not to report or say anything that could hurt her image and those of her cabinet ministers. Jacindanistas wont like the former frontman joining a pressure group critical of her regime.

from Don Brash of Hobson’s Pledge

Late yesterday afternoon the Rotorua District Council and Labour list MP Tamati Coffey announced they were “pausing” their divisive Bill to do away with the fundamental democratic principle of one person, one vote.

While the Government is trying to save face by calling a mere “pause” to the Bill – make no mistake, this is a comprehensive win. 

Technically, Parliament’s rules mean a bill cannot be withdrawn while it’s before a Select Committee, but with the Government pulling its support Mr Coffey’s Bill is left high and dry.

And with the admission that making Maori votes twice the value of those of non-Maori cannot be justified, no amount of tweaking can make the Bill consistent with the NZ Bill of Rights Act. In short, the Bill is finished.

More than 13,000 Hobson’s Pledge supporters submitted to the Maori Affairs Select Committee to achieve today’s victory. That volume stopped the outrageous rush to sneak this Bill through without it coming to the public’s attention.

Of those, 4,620 submitters opted to also submit orally (via Zoom or in-person). Allocating just five minutes per person, meant it would have taken at least 39 days of ten-hour hearings for the Select Committee to get through those who wanted to have a say. This alone prevented the Bill from passing before 1 June, meaning it couldn’t possibly apply to this year’s local elections.

Seeing the writing on the wall, as well as our campaign (and public anger) heating up, Labour decided that the only option was to make this U-turn. 

More than one million New Zealanders have seen our TV ad with targeted advertising across YouTube and Facebook.

The Government knew that from tomorrow our advertisements were hitting newspapers across the country, and we have TV ads slots booked from this weekend.

Seeing the media blitz coming, Jacinda Ardern’s office read the writing on the wall.

This is proof that well-organised people-power can win even against a majority government beholden to a Maori caucus. Despite the best efforts of the anti-democracy movement, democracy still works.

Where to from here?

We have won this battle, but the war isn’t over. Tomorrow the fight continues against the rest of the anti-democracy movement’s attempts to divide New Zealanders by race and undermine equality of citizenship.

We understand there is a major Three Waters announcement from Nanaia Mahuta this morning at 11am.

Thank you for your support.

Don Brash
Trustee, Hobson’s Pledge

Evidently those jabs were quite useless and that face diaper didn’t help either — well wadda you know…

Article

from the EU Times

On 28 March Matteo Lepore, Mayor of Bologna, and Massimo Bugani, councilor for the digital agenda and civic use of data, announced the City’s digital innovation plan 2022-2024.

“We will start with a pilot project for the city: at the center is the virtuous citizen, the one who, for example, separates waste well or does not waste energy, or uses public transport and does not take fines, or is still active with the Bologna Welcome Card. The Municipality says to these people ‘we will assign you a score’, as part of a circular reward with economic benefits to individual users.”

Social credit scores are already in use in various places around the world, but nowhere more than in the communist hell-hole that is China. The dystopian measurement acts similarly to a traditional credit score, however, as the name indicates, one’s score has little to do with their financial prospects or ability to pay off debt on time – social scores are all about your level of compliance to the regime and acceptance of the approved narrative. Where this dystopian coercion tool is used in an authoritarian dictatorship, like China, there is no such thing as individual rights or free speech.

Governments across the western world are exploring using this tool, especially in the wake of the Covid “pandemic,” which proved that governments can obtain almost limitless power in a crisis and set the stage for the next phase of the World Economic Forum’s plan – “you will own nothing and be happy.”

Italy will be the first in the EU, and the West, to implement a government-sponsored social credit system with the rollout of its new rewards-based program that aims to modify people’s climate change behaviour by assigning a score based on their compliance.

The program will kick off its pilot starting in the autumn of 2022 in Bologna. Citizens who comply with the radical climate change agenda by displaying “good behaviour,” such as correctly recycling or using public transportation, will be rewarded with cryptocurrency and discounts to local retailers, according to local newspaper Bologna Today.

Enrolees will be given a “smart citizen wallet” where their rewards can be accessed. The higher one’s score, correlating with good behavioural changes, will allow them access to more benefits.

At first, enrolment into the social credit score will be optional, however, there are justified concerns that the program will become mandatory in the future, not unlike the dystopian vaccine passport which has become a staple of everyday life in the EU.

MEPs warned these control measures were in the pipeline last year. In a third press conference – which took place on 24 November 2021 in the European Parliament in Strasbourg – four MEPs explained why the Green Certificate is violating peoples’ fundamental rights as well as other related topics. During this press conference Romanian MEP Cristian Terhes said:

“Clearly, we are witnessing right now the Chinafication of Europe. Because we see what is happening in China right now with the social credit score – where the government is monitoring and surveilling all the people from the beginning to end. Everything that they do, everything everywhere where they walk, it’s everything, you know – they control everything and they watch everything. This is an example of tyranny.

“When the government knows everything about you – where you go, what you did while you were there, where you enter – that’s the tyrannical system. And we’ve seen this system being implemented, right now, under the leadership of Ursula von der Leyen, slowly but surely, in the European Union.

“The green certificate was just the first step. There are a few more proposals right now under debate in the parliament: the European wallet ID, for example, the European social security card. All these things are creating a system that will monitor control, supervise and condition the rights of all the European citizens.”

Original article

An article that was written by Sally Cowley and appeared in The Mail under the heading Tom Parata, Man of Peace to mark the 80th anniversary of the first Anzac Day of 1915.

It is timely to remember those servicemen in training 80 years ago and one man in particular, who served his country in a different way.

Tom Parata of Waikanae gave many Kiwi soldiers cause to remember him with kindness and gratitude as later they fought in the trenches in France.

A letter from John H. McKay of Paraparaumu Beach to the Kapiti Observer in June 1960 tells of the Waikanae district being invaded by troops in 1915 and of the hospitality afforded by Mr Parata. In the winter of that year an epidemic of influenza had broken out in Trentham Military Camp and because of the conditions at the camp it was evacuated.

Mr McKay’s letter explains: “… well over 1000 patients were in the military hospital. Bell tents were their only accommodation and, with their tendency to leak, bedding was usually damp. Seven or eight men occupied each tent and fed from a dixie brought from the cookhouse.

“There must have been a hullabaloo about it because we had a visit from Bill Massey and Joey Ward and evacuation was ordered. Featherston camp was in course of construction but not ready, and the infantry troops packed up and moved to this district.

“We stayed for two days in some paddock off the main road and got bogged there and then shifted to the mouth of the Waikanae River.

“Discipline was relaxed in comparison to the huge establishment at Trentham and the troops thrived under the new conditions. The weather must have improved considerably because we had many bathing parades on the beach.

“One of my mates, a wealthy squatter from the Wanganui district had a huge car and we used to get around of an evening and look for diversion. We had many an evening of cards (and what goes with it) at Mr Tom Parata’s home…”

Mr McKay made only this brief mention of Mr Parata but his hospitality and the kindness of others in what was then a small village at Waikanae remained etched in his memory as many a time he sat it out in a broken down trench under Fritz’s bombardments.

High ranking
So who was Tom Parata? Born Tohuroa Parata in March 1879, he was one of the highest-ranking and best known chiefs in New Zealand and grandson of the founder of the Waikanae township, politician and Cabinet Minister, Wiremu Te Kakakura Parata.

Wi Parata had vainly led the fight for recovery of Wellington ‘tenths’ land that had been granted to the Anglican Church. He had lost, with the Chief Justice of the day declaring that the Treaty of Waitangi was a “simple nullity” so far as the court was concerned.

Wi’s grandson, Tohuroa (Tom), was of the highest rank in the Te Atiawa, Ngati Toa and Ngati Raukawa tribes and closely connected with many others. He was awarded the OBE in 1954.

Tom was the son of Hira Parata and grew up at Tukurakau near Waikanae Beach. When he was 10 the family moved house and lived on land now occupied by the Waikanae Hotel, adjacent to their marae, Whakarongotai.

Educated at Te Aute College and St Patrick’s College in Wellington, Tom later took up a position with the Ministry of Works. At school he had been a keen footballer and became an administrator and referee. He refereed throughout the country and in 1921 controlled the Hawkes Bay – Poverty Bay v. Springboks match at Napier. He was also prominent in cricket, was a life member and former judge of the Otaki Maori Racing Club and later became a bowls enthusiast. Among his many friends were former Governor-General Lord Freyberg (a rugby chum who at the time was a dentist at Otaki) and Sir Peter Buck.

Tohuroa Parata descended in direct line from Waipunahau, who married an English whaler named Stubbs, who was at Kapiti Island in the early part of last century. Waipunahau had two sons – Te Kakakura and Hemi Matenga. The latter became the husband of Huria who was later known as the “Grace Darling of New Zealand”. Te Rangihiroa, the father of Waipunahau, was prominently associated in the fighting that subdued the tribes opposed to Te Rauparaha in the West Coast areas.

A measure of the prestige Tom enjoyed because of his descent was that he was selected by his elders to marry Hera Herangi (granddaughter of King Tawhiao and sister of Princess Te Puea) but he had already chosen his bride, Teoiroa Amy Mita Kuti (Cootes) and refused their decision.

All Black
Tom married Teoiroa in 1900 and they had five children. His first son, Wene would become a Maori All Black and all his children would become well-known in the field of sport. Tom and Teoiroa lived near the marae in a house where Woolworths now stands. The Parata family at that time owned the block of land extending from the present Waikanae township to Kohekoke Road, Ngarara Road, and Sylvan Avenue.

Tom’s granddaughter, Wai Cooke of Levin, has fond memories of growing up in her grandfather’s house at Waikanae: “My grandfather was a fine man; stern when he needed to be, very much master of his own home, but a kind and loving man who enjoyed meeting people. The house was always full of friends and relations and I remember the sing songs we had around the piano in front of a big open fire. The marae was also the focus of much entertainment.

“The village was like a family where everyone knew and mixed with everyone else and I’m not surprised that my grandfather gave hospitality to the troops camped by the river mouth. He loved cribbage and bridge and in those days the evenings would go well with a glass of port wine or sherry.”

Wai says there would have been local men among those camped at the river mouth or who would have passed Tom’s name on to those who visited his home because he was so well-known for his hospitality. But she says the Parata home would not have been the only one in Waikanae to open its doors to the soldiers as the arrival of troops in the area would have been quite an event for the locals.

Tohuroa Parata OBE died at the age of 77 in 1956. His obituary perhaps best sums up the man: “As a wise counsellor he was much beloved by his own people, and by Europeans he was held in the highest respect for his character. In every respect he upheld the highest ethics of the rangatiratanga to which he belonged.”

He Tangata Rangimarie Whakamaharatanga ia i tenei ra (Anzac).

A man of peace, fondly remembered this Anzac week.

An instrumental by a young female Russian guitar player.

War is a racket, wrote U.S. Maj. General Smedley Butler in 1935. He explained: “A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small ‘inside’ group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.”

Gen. Butler’s observation describes the U.S./NATO response to the Ukraine war perfectly.

The propaganda continues to portray the war in Ukraine as that of an unprovoked Goliath out to decimate an innocent David unless we in the US and NATO contribute massive amounts of military equipment to Ukraine to defeat Russia. As is always the case with propaganda, this version of events is manipulated to bring an emotional response to the benefit of special interests.

One group of special interests profiting massively on the war is the US military-industrial complex. Raytheon CEO Greg Hayes recently told a meeting of shareholders that, “Everything that ‘s being shipped into Ukraine today, of course, is coming out of stockpiles, either at DOD or from our NATO allies, and that’s all great news. Eventually we’ll have to replenish it and we will see a benefit to the business.”

He wasn’t lying. Raytheon, along with Lockheed Martin and countless other weapons manufacturers are enjoying a windfall they have not seen in years. The US has committed more than three billion dollars in military aid to Ukraine. They call it aid, but it is actually corporate welfare: Washington sending billions to arms manufacturers for weapons sent overseas.

By many accounts these shipments of weapons like the Javelin anti-tank missile (jointly manufactured by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin) are getting blown up as soon as they arrive in Ukraine. This doesn’t bother Raytheon at all. The more weapons blown up by Russia in Ukraine, the more new orders come from the Pentagon.

Former Warsaw Pact countries now members of NATO are in on the scam as well. They’ve discovered how to dispose of their 30-year-old Soviet-made weapons and receive modern replacements from the US and other western NATO countries.

While many who sympathize with Ukraine are cheering, this multi-billion dollar weapons package will make little difference. As former US Marine intelligence officer Scott Ritter said on the Ron Paul Liberty Report last week, “I can say with absolute certainty that even if this aid makes it to the battlefield, it will have zero impact on the battle. And Joe Biden knows it.”

What we do see is that Russians are capturing modern US and NATO weapons by the ton and even using them to kill more Ukrainians. What irony. Also, what kinds of opportunities will be provided to terrorists, with thousands of tons of deadly high-tech weapons floating around Europe? Washington has admitted that it has no way of tracking the weapons it is sending to Ukraine and no way to keep them out of the hands of the bad guys.

War is a racket, to be sure. The U.S. has been meddling in Ukraine since the end of the Cold War, going so far as overthrowing the government in 2014 and planting the seeds of the war we are witnessing today. The only way out of a hole is to stop digging. Don’t expect that any time soon. War is too profitable.

Original article

This relates to the occupation by the Freedom Village for 23 days last February/March. The day following Commandant Coster’s Aktion to remove it on Ash Wednesday, Newshub claimed on that evening’s bulletin that “exclusive estimates” they were given was for a total of $960,000. Considering that the tent village was set up on a lawn and some asphalt paths, the reaction by many was “oh yeah?”

This highly dubious and certainly massively inflated figure can only have come from The Mallard, who appeared in the clip and for good measure threw in a claim that the topsoil had to be dug up because it contained “rodents, rats and feces”. Given that Portaloos were provided — even if Coster’s troops tried to prevent them being serviced — that allegation (and the rats) is improbable.

The only figures actually quoted as part of The Mallard’s $960K claim were $120,000 for resowing the lawn (which presumably happens regularly anyway) and $160,000 to repair the damage caused by Parnell-planted agent provocateur troublemakers to his slide when they set fire to a tent and fed it with gas canisters.

Newshub also managed to get a figure of $2750 for the cost of The Mallard hiring loud speakers to annoy everyone in the vicinity including local residents and members of the Coster Mob, but that hardly relates to anything caused by the protestors.

So those two figures quoted make $280,000 — is the rest the cost of The Mallard’s intended wall around Parliament?

Once again, this simply demonstrates how opaque the Labour government is on what it does with Taxpayers money.