Presumably if New Zealand "followed" the Arab world, Africa and the developing world, known for being scrupulously anti-racist, pro-individual rights and pro-liberal democracy, that would be an "independent foreign policy". However "following" the developed world, of countries that prohibit racism at the government level, that actually do let the judiciary hold the executive and legislature to account, that constitutionally and factually embrace free speech and individual rights to a relatively high level, is "following others".
Grant Robertson and Keith Locke mistake choosing to agree with the likes of the US, Australia, Germany and the Netherlands as being "not independent" which is frankly insulting. However, they wouldn't dare suggest that choosing to agree with South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Iran and China means you are "not independent".
It's just their own bigoted anti-Western scepticism over individual rights and the West coming to the fore - trying to paint the government as slavishly following the United States, even though the US has Barack Obama as President - who I don't doubt was the preference of both Robertson and Locke.
Keith Locke moreover supports this conference singling out the Palestinian issue, but happily lets the genocide in Darfur remain unmentioned, not least because Muslim states don't want to point a finger at a fellow Islamic regime committing racist murder, supported by China. Locke likes to see the UN as a meeting of equals, when it is a gallery from the relatively free to murderous butchering tyrants.
New Zealand attending this conference would imply its endorsement and being a party to an one sided set of resolutions - or it would be fighting hard to make it different.
20 April 2009
I used to like child abuse
until Cindy Kiro came along. So implies Lynne Pillay Labour list MP in saying "Cindy Kiro played an important role in opening our eyes to the detrimental effects of bullying and child abuse".
Child abuse was such a joke beforehand, and bullying? Hey it toughened you up - it was all good until the sagacious Cindy Kiro came along.
Please - she meant well, but she did nothing besides promote a nanny state and more welfarism.
Children don't need very highly paid bureaucrats being their advocates - they need families who give a damn and the state to enforce the law on lowlife parents and guardians who abuse and neglect. Dr Kiro widened the net of her concern to all parents, she thought her role was to ensure all kids did better - letting down those kids living in hellholes of terror and abuse.
Metiria Turei messaged me on my twitter account to say "Completely disagree with you view of Cindy Kiro. best child advocate this country has seen ever". Respect the fact she responded to me, but what has been the record in the last 9 years, what remains the tragic truth that too many kids, particularly in Maori families, are being ignored or abused. Cindy Kiro did precious little to target this.
Child abuse was such a joke beforehand, and bullying? Hey it toughened you up - it was all good until the sagacious Cindy Kiro came along.
Please - she meant well, but she did nothing besides promote a nanny state and more welfarism.
Children don't need very highly paid bureaucrats being their advocates - they need families who give a damn and the state to enforce the law on lowlife parents and guardians who abuse and neglect. Dr Kiro widened the net of her concern to all parents, she thought her role was to ensure all kids did better - letting down those kids living in hellholes of terror and abuse.
Metiria Turei messaged me on my twitter account to say "Completely disagree with you view of Cindy Kiro. best child advocate this country has seen ever". Respect the fact she responded to me, but what has been the record in the last 9 years, what remains the tragic truth that too many kids, particularly in Maori families, are being ignored or abused. Cindy Kiro did precious little to target this.
It IS about race
Merata Kawharu’s column in the NZ Herald this morning is an attempt to justify separate Maori political representation on the Auckland mega stadt rat.
She claims “Maori deserve their own voice”, well who doesn't? Nobody is seeking to stop it - the issue is whether Maori voting themselves is generating a voice, or whether it should be guaranteed, but others get no guaranteed voice. Moreover it implies that Maori have one voice - as if all the individuals of a race have one opinion. A rather nonsensical and sinister notion.
Quite how New Zealand got through local body restructuring in 1989, the Local Government Act 2002 without “honouring existing agreements” is beyond me – I didn’t notice Hikois then, so this “agreement” must be recent.
She then lies about what has happened “The abolition of Maori seats on the governing Auckland body must rank among the greatest challenges. It is, in short, premature and flawed.” There has been no abolition, as there are no such seats. The idea is new. You can’t abolish something that doesn’t exist.
She repeats Metiria’s call for mana whenua which she says includes “offering protection where relevant to those who may visit or live within the tribe's traditional domain.”. Hold on, protection where? On the tribe’s land, it need not have anything to do with local government. Elsewhere, it is the role of the state to offer protect from the initiation of force – the tribe is not excluded from that as all of its members have equal participation rights.
So she talks of a long history of Ngati Whatua wanting participation in governance of Auckland, but largely ignoring that for around three generations it didn’t have any special role.
However, how does she respond to the point that mana whenua IS about race? After all, Ngati Whatua is a tribe of people of one race. Maori representation is about Maori voters, Maori candidates and Maori representation. It is not about other races.
She doesn’t. She said it isn’t about race – but then talks about it being exactly about – not race, but a subgroup of a race.
Saying it isn’t about race, doesn’t change the fact that it is. It doesn’t change the fact that Maori have as much right to representation in local government as anyone else – nobody blocks it or restricts it. I am not represented just because someone of my race is elected (whatever that truly means), and I can be represented by people of other races.
Oh, and if you think belonging to a tribe should give you special privileges in government over others, then you haven’t learnt that nepotism is a dirty word in government in the civilised world. Setting aside any political representation on a basis that excludes people because of who their parents are is simply wrong.
If Maori seats are not about race, they would be seats open to anyone to get representation by whoever wishes to stand - which of course, they are not.
She claims “Maori deserve their own voice”, well who doesn't? Nobody is seeking to stop it - the issue is whether Maori voting themselves is generating a voice, or whether it should be guaranteed, but others get no guaranteed voice. Moreover it implies that Maori have one voice - as if all the individuals of a race have one opinion. A rather nonsensical and sinister notion.
Quite how New Zealand got through local body restructuring in 1989, the Local Government Act 2002 without “honouring existing agreements” is beyond me – I didn’t notice Hikois then, so this “agreement” must be recent.
She then lies about what has happened “The abolition of Maori seats on the governing Auckland body must rank among the greatest challenges. It is, in short, premature and flawed.” There has been no abolition, as there are no such seats. The idea is new. You can’t abolish something that doesn’t exist.
She repeats Metiria’s call for mana whenua which she says includes “offering protection where relevant to those who may visit or live within the tribe's traditional domain.”. Hold on, protection where? On the tribe’s land, it need not have anything to do with local government. Elsewhere, it is the role of the state to offer protect from the initiation of force – the tribe is not excluded from that as all of its members have equal participation rights.
So she talks of a long history of Ngati Whatua wanting participation in governance of Auckland, but largely ignoring that for around three generations it didn’t have any special role.
However, how does she respond to the point that mana whenua IS about race? After all, Ngati Whatua is a tribe of people of one race. Maori representation is about Maori voters, Maori candidates and Maori representation. It is not about other races.
She doesn’t. She said it isn’t about race – but then talks about it being exactly about – not race, but a subgroup of a race.
Saying it isn’t about race, doesn’t change the fact that it is. It doesn’t change the fact that Maori have as much right to representation in local government as anyone else – nobody blocks it or restricts it. I am not represented just because someone of my race is elected (whatever that truly means), and I can be represented by people of other races.
Oh, and if you think belonging to a tribe should give you special privileges in government over others, then you haven’t learnt that nepotism is a dirty word in government in the civilised world. Setting aside any political representation on a basis that excludes people because of who their parents are is simply wrong.
If Maori seats are not about race, they would be seats open to anyone to get representation by whoever wishes to stand - which of course, they are not.
Geneva racist conference should be boycotted
The UN is often seen by many as an organisation with lofty goals of getting the world together to agree on what is right and wrong, and have collaboration, co-operation, compromise all to make the world a better place.
The Durban Review Conference in Geneva is meant to be like that. Its stated goal is “evaluate progress towards the goals set by the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban, South Africa, in 2001.”
Racism is bad right? What’s wrong with eliminating racism, xenophobia and “related intolerance”? Nothing of course, until you find out what is really behind it.
You see a real conference would look at what has happened at Darfur, and how so many countries have provided succuour to the Sudanese government and be dismayed. It would look at the blatant racism in the media of many in the Middle East, not just what happens in the Israeli occupied territories.
So what is wrong with the conference? For starters, Islamic countries are seeking religion to be put on the same level as race. The Netherlands is boycotting the conference for that reason. While people have a right to freedom of religion (and no religion, which none of the conference documents acknowledge), it is NOT about race. Religion is a choice. Funnily enough, precious few Islamic countries allow Muslims to commit apostasy without severe punishment. Many countries are seeking this conference to pass resolutions banning offence against religion - which is an attack on free speech and open debate.
The United States is boycotting it because Islamic countries are seeking to return to the “Zionism is racism” focus, making it predominantly about Israel.
Australia is boycotting it for similar reasons, as delegates from some countries used it as a forum to declare anti-semitic views.
Canada, Italy and Israel are also boycotting.
So for Green MP Keith Locke to say boycotting would be “just to follow the US”, is a lie. It would be following many Western countries that share our values, values of free speech, freedom of religion (and to have no religion), and to be committed against racism as a whole, not to single out Israel on dubious grounds.
It speaks volumes about the immaturity of the Green Party’s foreign policy that it rejects a boycott because the US - and we are talking about the Obama Administration – is boycotting, along with many others. Of course given the Greens support race based politics in New Zealand why should one be surprised.
New Zealand should stand against the hijacking of this conference by countries that practice vile racism in their media against Jews, that ignore the racist based genocide in Sudan (why is that not mentioned but Israel is) and want to suppress religious dissent.
Murray McCully is considering New Zealand’s position – it is right to stand alongside our friends in opposing the doggerel that will come from Geneva.
The UN for decades was a forum for brutal dictatorships and autocracies to pontificate about South Africa and Israel, ignoring their own murderous records - it should not now be the forum for the Muslim dominated autocracies that span from the Maghreb to Malaysia.
UPDATE: Associated Press is reporting that Germany is boycotting now too - and that is a country that knows only too much from history about racism, and moving on beyond it.
UPDATE 2: Foreign Affairs MinisterMurray McCully has announced New Zealand is NOT attending. He said it needed to responsibly and productively address racism
GOOD!
The Durban Review Conference in Geneva is meant to be like that. Its stated goal is “evaluate progress towards the goals set by the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban, South Africa, in 2001.”
Racism is bad right? What’s wrong with eliminating racism, xenophobia and “related intolerance”? Nothing of course, until you find out what is really behind it.
You see a real conference would look at what has happened at Darfur, and how so many countries have provided succuour to the Sudanese government and be dismayed. It would look at the blatant racism in the media of many in the Middle East, not just what happens in the Israeli occupied territories.
So what is wrong with the conference? For starters, Islamic countries are seeking religion to be put on the same level as race. The Netherlands is boycotting the conference for that reason. While people have a right to freedom of religion (and no religion, which none of the conference documents acknowledge), it is NOT about race. Religion is a choice. Funnily enough, precious few Islamic countries allow Muslims to commit apostasy without severe punishment. Many countries are seeking this conference to pass resolutions banning offence against religion - which is an attack on free speech and open debate.
The United States is boycotting it because Islamic countries are seeking to return to the “Zionism is racism” focus, making it predominantly about Israel.
Australia is boycotting it for similar reasons, as delegates from some countries used it as a forum to declare anti-semitic views.
Canada, Italy and Israel are also boycotting.
So for Green MP Keith Locke to say boycotting would be “just to follow the US”, is a lie. It would be following many Western countries that share our values, values of free speech, freedom of religion (and to have no religion), and to be committed against racism as a whole, not to single out Israel on dubious grounds.
It speaks volumes about the immaturity of the Green Party’s foreign policy that it rejects a boycott because the US - and we are talking about the Obama Administration – is boycotting, along with many others. Of course given the Greens support race based politics in New Zealand why should one be surprised.
New Zealand should stand against the hijacking of this conference by countries that practice vile racism in their media against Jews, that ignore the racist based genocide in Sudan (why is that not mentioned but Israel is) and want to suppress religious dissent.
Murray McCully is considering New Zealand’s position – it is right to stand alongside our friends in opposing the doggerel that will come from Geneva.
The UN for decades was a forum for brutal dictatorships and autocracies to pontificate about South Africa and Israel, ignoring their own murderous records - it should not now be the forum for the Muslim dominated autocracies that span from the Maghreb to Malaysia.
UPDATE: Associated Press is reporting that Germany is boycotting now too - and that is a country that knows only too much from history about racism, and moving on beyond it.
UPDATE 2: Foreign Affairs MinisterMurray McCully has announced New Zealand is NOT attending. He said it needed to responsibly and productively address racism
“It would also need to avoid circumscribing freedom of expression, such as in the contentious area of ‘defamation of religion’.
“I am not satisfied that the wording emerging from preparatory discussions will prevent the Review Conference from descending into the same kind of rancorous and unproductive debate that took place in 2001.
“It is a pity that this should have been the case. Combating racism and related intolerance is an important cause, and one to which New Zealand attaches the highest importance.
“However the Review Conference in Geneva is not likely to advance the cause of race relations at the international level, and so New Zealand, like many other countries, will not be represented at it"GOOD!
19 April 2009
Too wide for the seat?
Stuff reports an article from The Age on what it calls an airline "fat tax", which of course is nothing of the sort. MSM clearly unable to tell the difference between a tax (a government imposed charge that isn't optional) and a fee, but I digress.
United Airlines, which in my experience meets all expectations of North American airlines for being abysmal (yet the US domestic market remains closed to foreign owned competitiors), announced that passengers that cannot fit into its seats will be asked to buy a second adjacent seat or a business class seat.
In effect, if you're too wide for your seat you need to buy another.
This is great news for those of us who suffered on flights where your neighbour extended over the armrest or even over the seat.
However, as Cactus Kate points out, business class may not make you immune from the impact of the grotesquely obese. Air NZ long haul, Virgin Atlantic, British Airways, Singapore Airlines and a couple of others have business class that puts a serious barrier between passengers, but many don't.
United Airlines, which in my experience meets all expectations of North American airlines for being abysmal (yet the US domestic market remains closed to foreign owned competitiors), announced that passengers that cannot fit into its seats will be asked to buy a second adjacent seat or a business class seat.
In effect, if you're too wide for your seat you need to buy another.
This is great news for those of us who suffered on flights where your neighbour extended over the armrest or even over the seat.
However, as Cactus Kate points out, business class may not make you immune from the impact of the grotesquely obese. Air NZ long haul, Virgin Atlantic, British Airways, Singapore Airlines and a couple of others have business class that puts a serious barrier between passengers, but many don't.
What intrigues me is how this will be policed by the airline - will there be a seat at check in for passengers to be placed in for the airline to test if you fit?
By contrast, the socialists in Canada ban airlines charging for an extra seat.
I'm flying BMI in business class tomorrow to the Middle East, I should have an empty seat beside me (because of frequent flyer status and the flight isn't full), and for that I will be glad.
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