The weirdest thing about elections in NZ isn’t the level of political corruption, it’s how everyone thinks there isn’t any. If you regulated election spending the entire right wing of NZ politics would evaporate overnight.
Jason Kemp
@dialogcrm.bsky.social
WordPress guy. Auckland, NZ - was in North Otago. Topics incl. music, film, cycling / biking -mtb, renewable energy, climate, tech, coffee, architecture. Quals in law, arts & marketing. Barista. https://dialogcrm.com
It's locals week at the Ōamaru penguin colony so we're spending the evening watching little blue penguins coming in to their nesting boxes ♥️🐧
BP announced more bumper profits. Oxfam's latest analysis finds that emissions from just five fossil fuel corporations were enough to contribute to around 1 in 4 heatwaves between 2000 and 2023. It’s time to #MakeRichPollutersPay! www.oxfam.org/en/press-rel...
"We're super smart rocket engineers working for a super genius who's so smart that even Iron Man thinks he's smart. Anyway, we fucked up the trajectory of a bit of our rocket so it's going to smash into the Moon and pollute it for ever. Would you like to buy our satellite internet?"
One of the ways we can know democracy is real and cannot be bought in meaningful ways is when the relationship between who gets and spends massive donations and who gets votes is very very far from linear, as it reliably is in NZ
Sassy Little Hobbit@sassypolitico.bsky.social · 12h agoIf you are disheartened by the first image, then look at the second image and then tell your mates to enroll to vote and then bully them into voting for greens ✌🏽
A retired friend was remembering when there were departmental secretaries at universities who basically project managed the departments. You could give them handwritten documents, and they would type them up. He was shocked when I said it didn't work like that for female academics.
Kate Manne@katemanne.bsky.social · yesterdayGenerative AI is catnip to the men who miss female sycophants katemanne.substack.com/p/a-culture-...
And they miss the context that almost every other OECD government did something similar, including governments that are ideologically aligned with National.
The economy will recover when actual nation builders not parasitical wealth extractors are on the Treasury Benches Vote Greens to give Labour backbone these elections www.nzherald.co.nz/business/slo...
It’s too late for the economy to save National now
OPINION: The economic recovery has stuttered too much to lift the voter mood by November.
nzherald.co.nz
Free & open for all: Unemployment rate up to 11-year high of 5.6%; Underutilisation rate up to 13-year high of 13.8%; Youth underutilisation up to 37% of workforce; Yet 111,000 work visas were granted & the RBNZ hiked to take 'heat' out of the economy. #nzpol open.substack.com/pub/thekaka/...
Unemployment worse than forecast & real wages fall
Unemployment rate up to 11-year high of 5.6%; Underutilisation rate up to 13-year high of 13.8%; Youth underutilisation up by 21,500 in a year to 37% of youth workforce; Yet 111,000 work visas granted
open.substack.com
if firing a geriatric old racist means the government will fall, then it doesn't deserve to stand #nzpol
#NZpol The RBNZ decided, when jobs were already fucked, unemployment simply "has to" go up or inflation won't come down. We had a main governing Party joining in with their coalition partner in sacking 1000's of workers. They plan MORE too. Connect. The. Fucking. Dots. Vote. This. Ideology. Out.
RNZ News Feeds@rnzrss.bsky.social · 2d agoUnemployment expected to push up to near 11-year high, economists warn
Greens being the grownups in the room again, formally requiring Brownlee to act. And we don't need scarequotes around racist. #NzPol
‘I’m not apologising’: Winston Peters stands by ‘racist’ comments
Peters claims his conversation with Christopher Luxon about his remarks is 'private'.
nzherald.co.nz
And the point is probably even stronger than that. If the coalition collapses, Luxon loses confidence Any significant decisions, including requesting an early election, would be subject to caretaker convention and could not be made unilaterally by him as PM. Majority support in the House is needed.
The backlash made Google pause the feature that made it easy, but it's of course still possible, and now put in everybody's heads. It was so hard for Google to predict the harm. Asking experts is a struggle for tech companies 🤪 www.npr.org/2026/07/31/n...
Google pauses AI satellite images, after fears of deepfakes in the sky
Journalists, human rights advocates and open source analysts recoiled in horror at the initial decision: "The opportunities for abuse and disinfo are literally boundless," said one.
npr.org
Faine Greenwood@faineg.bsky.social · 5d agoI used to do some work on the ethical use of satellite and drone imagery for aid and disaster response, and it is genuinely hard to express in words what a dangerous, stupid thing Google is doing by making it easy to use GenAI to create faked satellite imagery:
“The Electoral Commission has told staff to turn away voters who aren’t on the printed roll and who say they’re unenrolled, but has no plans to count how many people will be affected.” So nice to see democracy in action, nothing to worry about here, love NZ’s accessible and clear election process.
Newsroom NZ@newsroom.co.nz · 2d agoThe Opposition says people who think they're not enrolled should lodge special votes rather than being turned away from voting entirely.
Bonkers hail & sleet storm on our tin roof. SNOW DAY! IsItSnowingInDunedin.co.nz Dam straight
This is some incredible in-the-room reporting from @elitan.bsky.social and Maureen Farrell on how Meta got its vast, six-square-mile data center cooking in Louisiana www.nytimes.com/2026/07/27/t...
How Meta Got Everything It Wanted in a Secret Louisiana Data Center Deal (Gift Article)
A Times examination details how the Silicon Valley giant used private talks with local officials to start a project big enough to cover nearly six square miles.
nytimes.com
As an FYI Luxon has also used “replacement” language and when I criticized it on Twitter I got The Post editors telling me off cause I was a columnist at the time. And then of course they cancelled my column. People who have the power to stand up against white supremacy never want to.
The Nambassa festival film from 1979 got lost for decades & has now been found & restored. #nziff I was there helping a RNZ guy do interviews that probably got lost. Because of that tape recorder we got to meet anyone we wanted to.
#nziff the Crocodile film was very engaging. Screrning in Wellington ( twice) Ōtepoti & Ōtautahi too check your film festival programmes.
What if we all just made a pact to support our indie bookshops and public libraries to the best of our abilities instead of massive corporations 🙃
It’s important to understand “age verification” and “kick the kids off social media” laws as a gift to Big Tech. These policies allow surveillance capitalism to chug along full steam ahead and let Silicon Valley giants off the hook. Instead of regulating their biz model, we just put up age gates