A Newspaper Is A Dangerous Mind-Altering Substance

You ever get the feeling that your news media's attempting to push a particular narrative that's ... not really all that concerned with the truth?

I mean, seriously. Take a look at this story, from the front-page of yesterday's NZ Herald. Now, going off that headline ... and pretty much everything else in the article ... you'd be forgiven for thinking that cannabis was the *only* factor [or, indeed *a* substantive, salient factor] in the accident that occurred. Because it's repeated - over and over and over again, for two pages.

Yet you look a little closer, and there - nestled in a small sentence that would be altogether too easy to just gloss over if you're reading swiftly - is the actual reality of the situation.

Cocktail of prescription drugs.

Now, it doesn't specify just which "prescription drugs" are being talked about. Wouldn't go very well with the 'corporate line'! Especially if it turned out the guy was legitimately prescribed them!

But I would hazard a guess - and let me be clear about this, this is my uninformed, speculative opinion - that if they were being recreationally used, they were likely the sort of anti-anxiety or other meds which would stereotypically come with a "DO NOT OPERATE HEAVY MACHINERY WHILST UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF" disclaimer.

Or, in other words, the sort of meds you *really* shouldn't be driving upon ... and which would, odds on, be far more - even *exponentially* more - likely to have *actually* had a salient, significant role in the causation of this regrettable accident.

I'm not even going to get into the actual science around the impact of cannabis upon driving, here; although I *will* note that the addition of multiple drugs to an individual, in simultaneous use, can have 'quadratic' rather than mere 'additional' effects.

The fact is, that somebody, somewhere, doesn't want cannabis legalized via referendum.

And in order to deliberately frustrate this particular democratic outcome, they're going to pull out all the stops in order to do so.

No tragedy is going to be too great, no detail too small, for them to distort out of all proportion. They'll find the dirt to throw and the mud to sling - whether it exists there or not.

Now, we can tell from various developments over the past few years, that they've narrowed in on an 'attack angle' around 'drug driving'.

This has partially been driven by the previous National-led Government presiding over some popularization of the concept via some rather odd televised ads; and various attempts to look into bringing Australian-style roadside testing here.

It's also a tangential development to the legitimate expression of horror at our ever-high and lamentably lingering road toll. People want it to come down, so in desperation, will look in all manner of directions in order to try and do something about an escalating human tragedy. That's understandable. And when you're trying to make sense of a tragedy, it's only human nature to go for what seem like the 'easily preventable' "BUT WHY" factors in its (narrative) causation.

So going off the steadily increasing saliency of these "but why would we want to legalize cannabis, when our road toll is already so high??" talking-points all across talkback, social media, and letters to the editor ... it seems pretty clear that whomever, whatever's directing this agenda, has identified a strategy that works.

This kind of broad-based anti-PR snowjob offensive is rather like playing a game of Battleship. You fire out your volleys, and when you see the plume of smoke from having scored a hit on something .... you zero in and bombard that particular point with everything you've got, in the hopes of taking the whole thing down once having hit the magazine via repeated fusillades.

The National Party, as well, has chosen to capitalize directly upon this avenue of attack - bringing in several strikes at the present Government (including the Speaker of the House) as allegedly being "soft on drugs"; inviting victims and family of victims of crashes caused by, inter alia, *synthetic cannabinoids* [and let's remember - the comparison between consuming cannabis and consuming synthetic cannabinoids ... is perhaps akin to that between drinking alcohol, and drinking methylated spirits, while on meth] to come along to Parliament to add to the human pathos of the whole thing; introducing a private member's bill; and both getting themselves kicked out of the Debating Chamber and riddling the Minister for Police with questions upon the apparently epidemic crisis of "drug driving" here in New Zealand.

The goal of such things is quite clear, and - as always - at least as two-fold as it is reprehensibly two-faced. First and foremost, to make the Government of the day look bad, duplicitous, morally and otherwise. Like it's too limp-wristed to care about ordinary Kiwis' voices and vehicular safety.

And second, to keep trying to drive public opinion *away* from what's previously been pretty full-throated support for cannabis law reform, in any meaningful variety. [Which also helps to hammer the government - because apparently, giving ordinary New Zealanders their fair say on cannabis legalization makes everybody even tangentially proximate to the Cabinet of the day a raging pot-head]

You keep saying something often enough, repeatedly enough, and with sufficient permutations upon the same basic theme ... people start to believe it's this absolutely huge, overweening issue that's at crisis-epidemic-insurgency levels. And therefore, that Something, anything, Must Be Done to stop it. Somehow.

So over the next twelve to fourteen months, expect more of these stories, once again blown out of *any* semblance of reality, to be broadcast and shouted from the rooftops in superliminal propagandtastic efforts, with increasing frequency, right up until Polling Day for our cannabis legalization referendum.

Because the only "mind altering substances" THEY want you to have access to - are alcohol, newspapers, and National Party electoral leaflet material. Perhaps that's in ascending order of social destructiveness.

The Teen Euthanasia That Wasn't

Here's something potentially rather interesting. You know that 17 year old Dutch teenager whom an appreciably large proportion of just about everybody's newsfeed and/or Letters To The Editor section is jumping up and down about? The one apparently legally euthanized, and therefore how terrible a thing legal euthanasia is we can't have it here?

Well, apparently ... that's not actually what happened at all. Instead, it appears that what actually transpired was the kid applied for euthanasia, was refused, repeatedly attempted suicide anyway, and then eventually, just straight-up stopped eating/drinking - at which point, her family and medical team finally acquiesced to her wishes, and agreed not to force-feed her, moving her to palliative care.

Now, your mileage may vary as to ... well, pretty much this whole thing.

It could certainly be argued that actually having let the child go 'on her own terms' prior to all of this, would have been an awful lot less traumatic than having several months worth of repeated suicide attempts, endeavours to have her subjected to electro-shock therapy, before finally conceding that in the absence of ye olde feeding tube down nose, she was going to get her way eventually anyway.

But it seems like, at this point, an array of both news media organizations - and, for that matter, jump-up-and-down-hand-wringing social conservative pseudo-political groups, have deliberately bait-and-switched a story up, in order to try and oppose any meaningful progress on euthanasia law reform in their own countries, riding high off the back of one obviously tortured girl's personal misery.

I can understand why the idea of the state allowing 17 year olds to put themselves to death would be scary. Because it is. [I personally find the idea of forcing teenagers to carry pregnancies to term to also be rather scary, but then I am over here in the #ProDeath camp, apparently, so once again, YMMV]

But I'm not of the opinion that there's a very sensible comparison to be made between "we allowed a teenager to access a state-supported facility for getting us to kill them" - which is what everybody seems to think happened;

and "after many months of effort, we stopped attempting to force-feed or otherwise forcibly keep alive against her own wishes, a person".

It could be argued that the overall outcome is the same. And yeah, sure, one less person on the planet.

But I don't think that it is. Not really. And not least because only one of these things apparently happened.

Saudi Call For Getting Tough On Terrorism Case Of Serial Arsonist Taking Over Fire Department

So I see King Salman of Saudi Arabia's kicked off Saudi's chairmanship of the OIC by demanding that the world (and the Muslim world in particular), get tough on the supporters and enablers of terrorism. The country-level supporters, financiers, directors and enablers of terrorism.

Now, this is perhaps unfair to other insects, but this strikes me rather like a mosquito rolling up and shouting loudly: "I HAVE THE CURE FOR MALARIA!"

Or, I suppose, declaring Tony Blair has the answers when it comes to bringing about peace in the Middle East. But that one actually happened (with Blair transitioning into the role in question almost the same day he stepped down as UK Prime Minister), so clearly we are already well and away into the realms of blatantly counter-factual satire when it comes to a certain geopolitical grouping's activities in that region.

Seriously, for those who do not "get the joke" inherent in what the Saudis are saying - they are regularly identified as being lead vectors in the creation, financing, and other support/enabling of terroristic groups and operations, both throughout the Middle East and beyond.

Never mind ISIS, or their own ongoing links with Al Qaeda (for example in Yemen and in Syria- which has lead to the once again prima facie ridiculous, and therefore apparently straight-up outright de rigeur situation of forcing US co-operation with Al-Qaeda in both locales). The British intelligence establishment literally attempted to point out that Saudi Arabia represented the single most significant funder and proliferator of extremist ideology in Britain (so, you know, their so-called ally!) - and wound up with the report in question being suppressed out of fear that it'd damage the UK economically if the Saudis slapped an oil price-hike on them for daring to acknowledge the facts.

I hesitate, perhaps, to term that "economic terrorism" - yet given King Salman's recent remarks attempting to panic the world at large into aggressive action against Iran on grounds that the latter's sovereignty represents an allegedly unacceptable threat to global oil supplies ... the weaponization of economic interactions by Saudi itself (as has already happened to Canada, at The Kingdom's black-stained hands) suggests that this, too, is a case of bitter, bitter irony all the way down.

Let us be clear about this. Taking the Saudis seriously as anything other than a threat, when it comes to dialogue around combating terrorism, is to indulge their wilful penchant for fact-free chicanery.

Suggesting that they have a lead role to play in opposing the spread of terror, in any way other than by stopping funding and facilitating it themselves, is worse than useless.

It is like deciding that an arch-arsonist with an apparent pathological proclivity for criminal acts of combustion be appointed town fire-chief, whilst simultaneously mandating that everybody drive Ford Pintos, and drape bone-dry paper towels over their heating units. Followed by rolling out regularly-scheduled "come into our home, why don't you" 'inspection' opportunities.

And then - when somebody, whether Canada or Iran, actually says "enough is enough", and attempts to draw attention to the problem via diplomatic/publicatory or direct assistance to deleteriously affected countries, the defenders against Saudi-sponsored terror are either attacked directly, or sabre-rattled against as Next In Line For Some Good Ol'Fashioned Amerika-McWorldist FREEDOM (tm).

The whole thing's a charade - except with real guns, and real deaths. it is saddening and it is sickening that it has been allowed for so long to continue.

National Projecting Photo-Op Politics Failures At Government Over Budget

So holdup ... the National Party is attempting to make a big deal out of the person whose photo's on the cover of 2019 Budget having moved to Australia at some point in the past few years, yeah?

Now, it's a minorly amusing hardly-a-gaffe, sure. Stock photos are stock photos, and you can't always be assured that the models used in them are going to be entirely ideal if anybody *seriously* looks into them.

Yet as soon as I heard about this, my insta-reaction was to recall another Kiwi who got turned into a 'face of a brighter future', that then turned out to be a 'brighter future' over in Australia.

Way back in 2007, John Key made a much-vaunted visit to a place by the name of McGehan Close. It was a less well off street in what was then Prime Minister Helen Clark's Mt Albert electorate. He picked a 12 year old girl from among the residents, and took her up to Waitangi with him as a sort of walking campaign prop for what he sought to present as the neglected, the forgotten, and the left behind of the last Labour Government.

Which would be one thing. Except flash forward a few years, and it then turned out that the girl in question - Aroha Ireland - had 'fled the country' in pursuit of her own much more tangible "brighter future" over in Australia.

Like I say: it's one thing to use a stock-photo for a cover-shot, and then find out post-facto that the subject of said photograph has moved. I'd hardly say it's substantive.

It's *quite another* to promise to deliver meaningful change for a community, attempt to turn a child (and, by extension, those around her) into political stunts in pursuit of electoral success ... and then seemingly forget all about them once the psephological dust settles, only for their ongoing trajectory through life to provide something of an amazing QED for the fundamentally fallacious and empty nature of National's campaign rhetoric in practice.

But, you know, let's forget all about that and just quite literally judge a book (or, in this case, a Budget hard-copy) by its cover.

Still, to be fair to National - when it comes to the purchase of 'stock elements' turning out to have hidden complications, they're the local reigning experts.

Who could forget their 2014 use of "Eminem-Esque" elevator-muzak [itself an apt metaphor in so many ways for their tenure in office - that is, a weak pastiche imitation of actual governance, in much the same way that 'muzak' is to music]; and the resultant legal fallout which stemmed from their apparent failure to do proper and appropriate due diligence upon the 'stock element' in question.

All in all, I get the sense that National is making so much noise around things going on 'on the fringes' of the Budget, precisely because they have so very little of any actual substance (that's worth listening to) to say about the contents of the Budget itself.

This sort of 'stunt-ed' approach to political discourse came to dominate the Key-era National Party. Bridges is no Key, yet in the absence of anything else to contribute, we're getting Key-Lite (which, I suppose, means it's Politics-Lite-Lite).

A playbook which I am choosing to judge via its cover ... as there's precious little else to actually engage with.

National's Ongoing Budget-Grade Shenanigans - When Is It Appropriate To Lose One's Head?

So here's a funny thing. Right now, the National Party is demanding the resignation of Finance Minister Grant Robertson, after Treasury may have inadvertently made partial summaries of some parts of today's Budget semi-available two days early.

Yet back in 2012, when the Ministry of Social Development made a whole swathe of highly sensitive information about its clients and operations (including case-notes, personal details of at-risk children, medical records, legal paperwork etc. etc etc.) available to literally anyone who walked off the street into a WINZ office and used a self-service kiosk ...

... I don't think I recalled Paula Bennett appearing behind the National Leader of the day to demand that the minister in question responsible resign forthwith?

Possibly because said Minister was, in point of fact, Paula Bennett.

Who had earlier turned the rather more directly targeted unethical disclosure of private information about beneficiaries into something of an art form - endeavouring to use it to silence two critics of hers when it came to the abolishment of a training allowance which Bennett had, herself, taken advantage of some years earlier while a beneficiary.

Now, thankfully, Bennett cannot be demanded to resign from a Ministerial role (whether presiding over MSD, or any other) ... as the results of the last Election mean she's no longer on the Treasury Benches. (She was shuffled out of MSD, to take over portfolios including as Minister of State Services - which curiously, was also the portfolio area that *another* "leak" of private and personal information for apparently psephological gain took place from, pertaining to one Winston Peters and his pension payments, in the run-up to the last Election. Not that I'm suggesting the pattern indicates *direct* intent here, you understand)

Yet it does seem a bit peculiar that National was prepared to tolerate not just repeated, but *outright and downright intentional* disclosures of private information never intended for the public sphere and which had clearly and manifestly detrimental impacts for the vulnerable parties involved ...

... but is now baying for blood and a Scalp over the inadvertent partial-summary release of information which was to become public knowledge *anyway* a mere three days later.

Perhaps the argument is that the Treasury head serang who insinuated, upon GCSB advising, that a "hack" was to blame for the release, is a man lacking in judgement and therefore that whomsoever appointed him is thusly likewise - and therefore should go? In which case, I can only point out that Maklouf was first appointed, and then re-appointed, under the previous National Government.

Still, while I yesterday sought to argue that National's whipping up of a furore over this issue had all the inconsistency of rancid milk purporting to be cream, there is nevertheless at least *one* point on which I have to concede they've been stable in their relative stances:

That part around "baying for blood" over a "release of information which was to become public knowledge *anyway*" a mere few days later. It's exactly, as you may recall, what Simon Bridges sought to do after his rather high transport expenses were 'leaked' to the Media a few days prior to their official disclosure was scheduled to occur.

Of course, funny thing - he didn't seem *quite* so keen to defend the weaponized use of the [accurate, as it happened] information thusly obtained *that time*, did he.

Why The Americans Waited Nine Years To Bring Up Taking Our Eye Out Of The Five

Another article, published today, is doing the rounds about the prospect of NZ being booted out of the '5 Eyes' 'security' club, due to the alleged perforation of the heart of our politics by the People's Republic of China.

I've said it before and i'll say it again.

The problem the Americans have identified was *worse* under National. Yet for nine years the US did NOT seek to proffer this 'threat' at us.

The reason for this is quite simple.

They don't actually care nearly as much as they are pretending about the issue of Chinese 'infiltration'. They DO care, at least somewhat, if i) your governing party is "red" in its electoral material [regardless of its actual substance in practice], ii) it's not all that keen on supporting their general penchant for overseas military adventurism.

So therefore, National got a 'free pass' despite a Chinese intelligence agent in its Parliamentary Caucus, because it made the 'right noises' about wanting to have helped invade Iraq, etc. etc. and not rocking the boat with neoliberalism.

Meanwhile, the Labour/NZF/Greens Government can move to block Huawei from getting the contract for our 5G cellphone network upgrade, start rolling out a policy of attempting to *actively encourage* the US to engage in the Pacific to head off the PRC, and can even preside over the problem of PRC influence/infiltration actually being talked about even at a Parliamentary Select Committee inquiry ...

... and because it is 'convenient' to do so, because it lines up with other priorities, this smokescreen approach of "The Chinese are Puppeteering the Parliamentary Labour Party" gets rolled out.

Whether because the Americans are generally keen on 'disciplining' NZ for not being totally 100% in-line on various geopolitical fronts (and the prospect of trading with Russia may also be in mind here); or whether it is in a bid to surreptitiously 'influence' our domestic politics via the fostering of "Red Scare" style perceptions about the current incumbent Government so as to forment its subsequent replacement via more 'pliable' (by both Chinese *and* American foreign pressures, apparently) National-led administration.

National's Budget Pre-Game Is Double Standards All The Way Down

So let me get this straight:
1. the National Party somehow acquires Budget 2019 materials two days early;
2. Treasury reports it's been hacked and that they've referred the matter to the NZ Police's special cybercrime and security department.
3. National claims that it actually got the papers "lawfully"; Simon Bridges states that Grant Robertson should resign as Finance Minister because of National's receipt of them

Both stories can't be true. But what I found rather interesting was the quite drastic difference between how National's reacting to a potential hack of the Government (which has given them a temporary political advantage - it meant they had a big Distraction for their announcements of the outcomes of their internal review into bullying culture within National, and Alfred Ngaro's Tamaki-inspired backdown on setting up a sidecar support party with which to game MMP) ...

... and National's own screeching vituperation when it came to their *own* instances of themselves or their (Cetacean) subordinates/black-ops crew being hacked in years past. Then, it was quite a different tune - anybody even suspected of knowing who the hacker(s) might be finding themselves with sketchy police search sprees, bank service impairments "just in case", and the high hell-raising that some sort of massive attack upon the very political and social fabric of this country was immanently in progress. [by hackers exposing what National and its cronies had been up to, I mean - not, you see, by WhaleOil, the PM's office, et co, themselves. Funny how that works]

I know it's a truism to state, but it's almost like nobody actually cares about "the rules" over there, and that the only principle they hold dear to is the "Power Principle", the desire to "win" at all costs, and somehow make it look like their own leader isn't in a near constant state of Schrodinger's Resignation, via scalp-demanding from just about anyone and everyone else.

Meanwhile, I was also rather surprised to see the National Party attempting to attack the Government for an increase in Defence spending. I mean ... this is not what you'd expect from National - especially given their rather flagrant over-enthusiasm in years both past and present to deploy the NZDF in support of American military adventurism in the far-flung reaches of the world.

I thought the National Party were supposed to be at least somewhat keen on having a useable and fit-for-purpose Defence Force? But, then, I guess not. Looks like the only Defence they're really seriously interested in, is against the Government's incumbency, by any means necessary. Typical.

The overwhelming impression one gets when looking over the Nats' Budget pre-game, then, is very much the same as that which we've had by looking at them in Opposition these past eighteen months all up.

Namely - it's double-standards, all the way down.