Coronavirus - New Zealand
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Jacinda has been reading far too many overseas fap pieces about her leadership. Compared to other countries yes it is better, but she's in la la land if she thinks everyone is going to 'oh! ok, righto, whatever you say' every time she frowns in concern. We're way past the team of 5 million hokey shit or be kind. We want facts and a concrete plan that doesn't rely on pummeling the economy or bringing life to a screeching halt because there is a covid case.
They've had six bloody months to develop policy and implement best practice. The fact that they AGAIN believed all the overseas we are the bestest 4 eva fap when we were at level one just shows how much nonsense there has been. By pure luck we haven't had monster outbreaks, just small ones to demonstrate how foolish and mediocre elements of the response have been.
(I'm not saying National would have done much better before anyone bleats that.) But I cannot stand people who want all the plaudits when things are going well, then duck for cover and babble platitudes when the shit hits the fan. Has anyone involved in the fuck ups lost their job because of sheer incompetence? Or do Ash and Cindy just say they take responsibility but those reporting to them carry on as usual?
I'm so, so sick of spin and vagueness. As I posted earlier, bobbing in and out of lockdown is not a strategy.
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@Mokey dunno, I think there seems to still be a decent chunk of people willing to be, er, guided by her.
Purely anecdotal, but think it was last week, and some American anti-vaxxers were protesting in Whangarei, and they had a 'crowd' of about 30 protesting with them over the lockdown and not wanting to wear masks (ironically a few were) social media was full of condemnation for these people who are out there stirring and will lead us all back to L4...
I think many will still abide by the 'rules' set down by our Govt. but I think a bigger number are a bit pissed off and want some answers, because you know they must have a plan they are working on for the next 12-18 months , particularly what they plan on doing if no vaccine emerges.
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@Mokey said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
(I'm not saying National would have done much better before anyone bleats that.) But I cannot stand people who want all the plaudits when things are going well, then duck for cover and babble platitudes when the shit hits the fan. Has anyone involved in the fuck ups lost their job because of sheer incompetence? Or do Ash and Cindy just say they take responsibility but those reporting to them carry on as usual?
So much this.
I also think that to some extent National's ability is a red herring. As a general rule someone who proves themselves useless doesn't get a second go, because it just reinforces their delusions of competence. They think they have a mandate to go on being crap. Better to send a signal to everyone, government and opposition, that incompetence will not be tolerated.
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@taniwharugby I reckon the longer time goes on without a concrete plan or strategy other than lockdown bob, the pissed off number will grow bigger, and the number of asshats willing to flout rules will also grow. People won't accept official incompetence either, if they are suffering personally (lost job, kids at home, business shut etc)
Vague shit doesn't reassure those who are uncertain or angry or frustrated by change and/or life volatility. It makes it worse. Clear direction and evidence of robust information, facts, and processes/people is what reassures. If the govt doesn't understand that, or they aren't ready, they are going to have a very big problem on their hands.
Edit to add: relying on a future vaccine is not a great strategy either. We have no idea when that might be or if it will even work, or if herd immunity will happen etc etc.
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@Mokey As David Seymour alluded to, we don't need to be spoken to like children. Or maybe we are in the minority and the majority like to be comforted by all those be kind sentiments and the idea that we are leading the world in the covid19 battle?
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as many have alluded to, mental wellbeing is going to be a major concern, plus the health of communities given the restrictions imposed on communities to do what makes them, well communities.
School cultural events, school sports, community cultural events, community sports, markets, fundraising etc and the organisations that fund and sponsor these activities.
The yo-yoing of levels has far more implications than the obvious in terms of the economy, it will impact our kids into the future as well (not just paying back the debt generated from this)
Which is why people need to see light at the end of the tunnel, plenty sip Cindy's coolade, if she had a decent plan to guide NZ out of Covid AND beyond, she would walk this election, right now though, I reckon there is a massive amount of people undecided how they will vote, waiting for a leader to come out and show some true leadership and direction
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@taniwharugby said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
Which is why people need to see light at the end of the tunnel, plenty sip Cindy's coolade, if she had a decent plan to guide NZ out of Covid AND beyond, she would walk this election
That's the thing with the current approach though, there is no light at the end of the tunnel. The entrance caved in behind us and we're waiting there for someone to come and dig us out.
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@Mokey said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@taniwharugby I reckon the longer time goes on without a concrete plan or strategy other than lockdown bob, the pissed off number will grow bigger, and the number of asshats willing to flout rules will also grow. People won't accept official incompetence either, if they are suffering personally (lost job, kids at home, business shut etc)
Vague shit doesn't reassure those who are uncertain or angry or frustrated by change and/or life volatility. It makes it worse. Clear direction and evidence of robust information, facts, and processes/people is what reassures. If the govt doesn't understand that, or they aren't ready, they are going to have a very big problem on their hands.
Edit to add: relying on a future vaccine is not a great strategy either. We have no idea when that might be or if it will even work, or if herd immunity will happen etc etc.
Soft porn must sell, but you might have missed your calling. Common sense and political comment looks good.
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@dogmeat said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
Re "The cure is worse than the virus" that is a very popular assertion on her and trending in the broader population too although still a minority perspective.
However it is far from proven. Nowhere that has adopted a more laissez faire approach than NZ is faring any better. Winger name drops Sweden at every possible opportunity despite the evidence damning his argument but the simple facts (damn facts) is it is way too early to make a call on which is the right approach economically.
Or it may be that it is proved too draconian, but notwithstanding the current lockdowns (genuine question) where is fairing better economically?
Better is relative. There are a lot of people doing it tough and it's only going to get worse, but travels fucked everywhere. Tourism is goneburger globally. The simple truth is, as Sweden found out, the global economy is so interconnected, there is no way you can say we are not going into lockdown. Effectively your economy shuts down anyway.
I think I agree with your point, which I interpret as being that even if a country doesn't go into lockdown, if all its neighbours do its economy will bear a significant economic impact. What is interesting is that infection rates are still falling in Sweden, whereas they tend to be growing in most of Western Europe. As you note, it's too early to judge the best strategy, although one can safely say that most of Europe stayed in lockdown too long.
I'm fucked off with Labour because they dicked around during the two months of L1 and wasted an opportunity. I am totally over the whole pandemic thing and wish I was sitting sipping a cold beer in Colombo right now as was the plan, but saying we should just let it run its course in NZ is totally impracticable. I also resent people who are selfish and not doing the right thing because they are simply prolonging the agony fore all of us, but I blame the govt for a lot of that as well by encouraging false optimism - followed by despondency - with al the Cindyspeak.
It's a fucking hard one. I can I guess accept prolonged L1. I also expect (always did) further cases but FFS I hope the govt are going to display a greater level of competency next time round.
What I would like to see is L1 robust controls of border and everyone who touches it resident and traveller so that the odd case is immediately contained and we don't have to move out of L1. Do that and I'll happily scan QR codes all day while wearing my mask. I'd wear it all day - in bars and restaurants - everywhere but at home to get as close to normality as possible for as long as possible.
That sounds entirely reasonable!
I want great processes and controls not just great soundbites and caring looks.
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@Mokey said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
Jacinda has been reading far too many overseas fap pieces about her leadership. Compared to other countries yes it is better, but she's in la la land if she thinks everyone is going to 'oh! ok, righto, whatever you say' every time she frowns in concern. We're way past the team of 5 million hokey shit or be kind. We want facts and a concrete plan that doesn't rely on pummeling the economy or bringing life to a screeching halt because there is a covid case.
They've had six bloody months to develop policy and implement best practice. The fact that they AGAIN believed all the overseas we are the bestest 4 eva fap when we were at level one just shows how much nonsense there has been. By pure luck we haven't had monster outbreaks, just small ones to demonstrate how foolish and mediocre elements of the response have been.
(I'm not saying National would have done much better before anyone bleats that.) But I cannot stand people who want all the plaudits when things are going well, then duck for cover and babble platitudes when the shit hits the fan. Has anyone involved in the fuck ups lost their job because of sheer incompetence? Or do Ash and Cindy just say they take responsibility but those reporting to them carry on as usual?
I'm so, so sick of spin and vagueness. As I posted earlier, bobbing in and out of lockdown is not a strategy.
Sunday Telegraph piece
New Zealand's lust for lockdown is the latest example of vapid political virtue-signalling
NZ may have contained the virus for now with the low mortality rates, but it has taken draconian policies and economic pain to get there
Progressive mythology always demands a socialist valhalla; a nation to be idealised and held up as an inspiration. For years, Scandinavia, and particularly Sweden, played this role. The stereotype was never entirely accurate; Scandinavian social democracy is a far cry from full-throated socialism, yet it remained influential.
In the face of the pandemic, however, the tables have turned; now it is the libertarian Right who are lining up to applaud Swedish exceptionalism, while progressives liken their controversial strategy to a form of eugenics. With Sweden consigned to the naughty step, the Left needs a new country to fetishise, and they have alighted on New Zealand.
This was underway long before the virus arrived, thanks to NZ’s intoxicating combination of centre-left politics and a charismatic, young and importantly, female, leader: Jacinda Ardern. Her decisive leadership following the mass shooting in Christchurch propelled the New Zealand PM to global prominence, and she has since enjoyed fawning media coverage surpassing even the high water-mark of Trudeau-mania.
The Left applauded NZ’s “wellbeing budget”, emphasising citizens’ happiness over GDP growth, and cheered when Ardern brought her baby into the UN assembly hall. Their zero-tolerance approach to Covid-19 has been especially influential. A group of weak-minded MPs and peers are currently urging our own Government to pursue a similar aim of total eradication.
We should be under no illusion - this is no model for New Zealand to follow, let alone a sophisticated global economy like ours. NZ may have contained the virus, for now at least, registering the lowest mortality rates in the OECD, but it has taken genuinely draconian policies and great economic pain to get there. The Ardern administration is eliminating rights on a scale more reminiscent of authoritarian China than a Western liberal democracy.
Last week, the whole of Auckland was sent into lockdown after the government announced a grand total of four new cases in the city. GDP has taken its biggest slide in three decades. A total ban on foreign arrivals has endured for months, with catastrophic results for tourism, directly employing 8.4 per cent of the workforce. New Zealanders returning from abroad must pay for the privilege of isolating in military-guarded facilities, to the tune of more than £1,500 per head. One man recently received a six-week jail sentence for hugging a friend quarantining in a detention centre.
The NZ experience should serve as a cautionary tale about the normalisation of overreach. Though the country has not recorded a single covid death since May, the government decided to postpone the Autumn elections following the small-scale outbreak this month. Progressives, so alert to the subversion of democracy in the USA, had little to say about this extraordinary over-reaction.
An elimination strategy has made them hostages to fortune; with precedence established, it will be politically toxic to change course. Ardern has ridden high in the polls so far, but if such disruption continues, public appetite for keeping the country virus-free at any cost will surely wane, and the recent outbreak, despite NZ’s geographic isolation and its draconian policy response, suggests no country can postpone the inevitable.
The implications of New Zealand’s autarchy go beyond its shores as well. Tourism accounts for a third of jobs in Fiji, Palau and Vanuatu; and two thirds of their visitors come from Australia and New Zealand. Yet amid mounting poverty and unemployment, island leaders’ pleadings for air bridges seem barely to have registered with an administration myopically focused on elimination. In seeking to be kind, the Ardern administration has ended up being very cruel indeed.
Enthusiasts for this model imply that elimination, like the happiness budget, and like Ardern herself, puts people above the callous vicissitudes of the balance sheet. As we are increasingly finding, the two cannot be so easily disentangled. Excessively harsh lockdowns have become a form of international virtue-signalling; something only wealthy nations can afford, but which promises catastrophe for the world’s poorest.
Before the recent spike, commentators lauded Ardern as being “on course to eradicate the virus completely.” The ambition was childish and hubristic in the extreme. Until the planet reaches a state of elimination, New Zealand will have to stay in indefinite isolation, with domestic lock-downs a likely fixture of life, perhaps for years to come. The economy cannot bear this for long. Nor can the people.
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@JC said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@Crucial said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@JC said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@Crucial said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@dogmeat I don't disagree with that but would add that I find it surprising that many 'commentators' with a propensity to tell the govt to stop interfering with their lives are the very ones saying 'but the Govt didn't tell us what to do properly'.
If you want personal responsibility then for god's sake take it. You don't need Cindy to tell you when to wash your hands or wear a mask in a crowd or be more careful if any signs of a cold etc.
I too fell into complacency in L1. That's on me. I should have seen this coming as well and made sure I was more prepared. I'm happy to berate the govt for incompetence but not for not telling me to do what I should have realised myself.That's a huge misrepresentation of what people are saying. It ignores the fundamental part of the story, which is that the government committed us to a path. While it may have been a good idea to lock down, it's in no way unreasonable to ask them what their next step in the plan is, and to be completely pissed off when the answer is that we don't need to see the detail or its a work in progress, a "moveable feast". If the government intervenes it needs to have a plan for finishing the job and they should tell us what it is. They did, and they aren't, and the reason is because they have no fucking clue how to execute anything.
BTW, you keep saying you'll be happy to berate the government for incompetence. No, no you won't. You're a Jacinda fan. That's OK, your politics are your concern. But if you really are as even-handed as you make out, you must surely admit that where incompetence is concerned, we're looking at it right now.
I possibly wasn't clear enough. My comments were aimed at a certain vocal group of 'commentators' not at most people.
I agree about it not being unreasonable to ask for certainty or aims but disagree that thoe answers are actually available. I do buy into the 'moving feast' argument. We have to suck it up and make decisions based on our own best guesses.
I'm not sure what incompetence you are referring to that 'we are looking at right now'.The disconnect between what Ministers thought was happening and what actually was.
The lack of a rigorous reporting mechanism to make sure that execution mirrored the rhetoric.
The belief that front-line border workers were resistant to routine testing when they were asking for tests. The lack of a will to enforce testing on those frontline staff because it would be heavy handed.
The straw man arguments suggesting that a reasonable expectation of regular testing of front line border staff was the same thing as asking for all 7000 to be tested daily (don't tell me Jacinda didn't know the difference).
The fact they appear not to have used the period when we were in L1 to create a more coherent pathway when the virus re-emerged, including response levels, upgrades to the ICU capacity (remember that?), inequitable impacts on businesses.
The entirely reactive way of managing every aspect of this crisis.
The lack of accountability for all of the above, or the will to enforce accountability on the people who were responsible if the ministers don't think they themselves were.It may be that some of these aren't incompetence, they may instead be straight out lies.
This govt have made mistakes for sure.
The messages weren't overly strong while we basked in the L1 glory. There has been too much trust in important aspects being actioned quickly and properly without double checking.
They have a strategy of treading a fine line on expecting people to do the right thing and waiting for the likely failings to occur before acting.
I'm not actually a Jacinda fan or a Labour fan for that matter. I think this crisis has highlighted that they have a paucity of truly competent people and that they place too much trust in areas of the public service that keep making similar mistakes.
What I'm commenting on is what I see as hypocrisy from those that complain about aspects of govt lack action in areas where they can take personal responsibility.Who does this? Once again it's entirely reasonable for people to say to the government "You made a choice on our behalf. So be it. But you've now made a mess, you don't get to walk away from cleaning it up, now what's the plan for that?"
As an example I had to come into town last Saturday and my observation was that people by and large were acting no differently than if we didn't have a pandemic happening. Lots of social mixing, ignoring tracing, being in crowded areas without masks etc. Are they waiting for the govt to enforce them to think?
Yeah, some people are arseholes. Others though are acting exactly as you'd expect of people who were told by a government that demanded their trust that all was well. We are apparently still the envy of the world.
We have a shit attitude of entitlement happening where people will do things because they are allowed to 'because they can'.
I can eat takeaways and drink coke all day too but I don't because I take responsibility for my own body.Careful with that argument bro. If you are ordered into lockdown for your own good who is in fact taking responsibility for your own body? Hasn't the government taken responsibility for it, even to the extent of removing your personal autonomy and agency?
Do you think you two were married in a previous life? :face_with_stuck-out_tongue_winking_eye:
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@pakman said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
NZ may have contained the virus for now with the low mortality rates, but it has taken draconian policies and economic pain to get there
I am loving the fact that the word "draconian" is joining the pantheon of words, such as "ironic" and "acronym", with meanings being changed by fucking idiots.
Hash-tag: irony.
BTW - in case anybody missed it - I'm implying the author of that Sunday Telegraph piece was a virtue-signalling fucking idiot. -
@Kruse said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@pakman said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
NZ may have contained the virus for now with the low mortality rates, but it has taken draconian policies and economic pain to get there
I am loving the fact that the word "draconian" is joining the pantheon of words, such as "ironic" and "acronym", with meanings being changed by fucking idiots.
Hash-tag: irony.
BTW - in case anybody missed it - I'm implying the author of that Sunday Telegraph piece was a virtue-signalling fucking idiot.I digress: acronym being changed to?
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@pakman Yeah saw that at the weekend. Despite real misgivings about Cindy's performance (other than the spin which I think everyone will concede she is great at) it really is a crock of shit.
Author knows so little about NZ that it originally talked about NZ's capital Auckland going into lockdown
Also liked this gem amongst all the other BS "The implications of New Zealand’s autarchy" along with the patronising "this is no model for New Zealand to follow, let alone a sophisticated global economy like ours"
Seems to have missed that it was opposition parties pushing for the election to be delayed as well.
In short it reads like a sixth formers essay and a bad one at that.
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@dogmeat said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@pakman Yeah saw that at the weekend. Despite real misgivings about Cindy's performance (other than the spin which I think everyone will concede she is great at) it really is a crock of shit.
Author knows so little about NZ that it originally talked about NZ's capital Auckland going into lockdown
Also liked this gem amongst all the other BS "The implications of New Zealand’s autarchy" along with the patronising "this is no model for New Zealand to follow, let alone a sophisticated global economy like ours"
Seems to have missed that it was opposition parties pushing for the election to be delayed as well.
In short it reads like a sixth formers essay and a bad one at that.
Is the walrus writing political articles now?
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@canefan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@dogmeat said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
Is the walrus writing political articles now?
I did think that!