Interest.co.nz's Jenée Tibshraeny joined journalist Bernard Hickey for a chat about the news of the week on his podcast on Friday.
The pair discussed topics of interest to interest.co.nz readers, who may like to have a listen on Bernard's website, The Kākā.
Issues covered included the protests at Parliament, the minimum wage rise, inflation, the Reserve Bank's upcoming review of monetary policy, and changes to the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act.
19 Comments
I completely disagree with everything you guys said about the protest, Particularly Hickey who’s opinion is ironically divorced from reality, and at the same time contemptuous and aggressive towards protestors. The term misinformation in todays context means “you’re saying something I don’t like”. The chasm between your opinions and mine is now so great that trying to communicate is almost useless. However, if you want to try to understand our opposing views then I’d recommend that you watch Dr Peter McCullough being interviewed by Joe Rogan on Spotify. Realize that McCullough has an H-index of 117. Look up what H-index means in terms of being a scientist, and appreciate that our views (the so called antivax crowd) are valid and reasonable.
Just so we’re on the same page about what those views are, I’ll articulate them. (1) There is no reason to wear masks. (2) I am not vaccinated and I don’t plan on getting vaccinated because (a) I’m healthy (b) I’ve already had it, (c) bodily autonomy & the Nuremberg code of medical ethics. (3) Ivermectin and vitamin D and a bunch of other inexpensive drugs are safe and effective ways to combat covid. (4) Omicron is such a mild disease that it would be far more preferable for healthy people to get Omicron that get the vaccine and potentially end up with debilitating myocarditis, or thrombosis / blood clotting / stroke. (5) It’s absolutely insane to be vaccinating children against covid.
The crowd at Parliament building are not aggressive, despite the best efforts of the MSM to paint that picture. It’s pretty obvious looking at the videos that they’re supportive and optimistic, filled with hope. I think the actions of Trevor Mallard are pretty despicable though. Turning the water sprinklers on the crowd, and playing loud anger inciting messages at all hours of the night. That’ll go down in history.
fat pat,
Your summary is articulate and measured.
It's so refreshing to see more citizens of New Zealand question the myopic approach of this Government.
Mallards actions, I'd interpret, represent the most honest reflection of a politician during this crisis. It shows me just how juvenile, condescending and low calibre are the cohort of leadership currently destroying the fabric of our society. They are so detached from reality it's almost as though Aliens have landed in the Beehive, no doubt comfortable in their belief of galactic superiority. To think that they come unstuck thanks to a few freedom campers gives me a smile from ear to ear.
Thank you. My respect for the protesters mounts daily.
Interesting rebuttal of Dr McCullough's interview - would be interested to hear your thoughts Fat Pat?
https://healthfeedback.org/claimreview/joe-rogan-interview-with-peter-m…
Yeah Nah. A bunch of unconvincing gotyas
I concur with McCullough. Look at the first point that supposed "fact check" makes: Inaccurate: The COVID-19 vaccines aren’t experimental. Their safety and efficacy were demonstrated in clinical trials... blah blah. Yeah sure – check out the British Medical Journal’s scathing attack of the clinical trials and withholding of data. Unless you have a time machine then you don’t know what the future holds for vaccine takers. I've spent hours pouring over the journals over the last few years. I could go on and on with each point & counterpoint but I'm not going to.
(1) There is no reason to wear masks. - can you elaborate on this? I agree we're all likely to encounter the virus but at the rate of spread of Omicron surely it's better we don't all get it at once?
(2) I am not vaccinated and I don’t plan on getting vaccinated because (a) I’m healthy (b) I’ve already had it, - your call but the risks are clearly in favour of vaccination, maybe less so with Omicron but likelihood of vaccine harm is an order of magnitude lower.
(c) bodily autonomy & the Nuremberg code of medical ethics. - you still have an option and the mandates are temporary. I understand this would be inconvenient for the unvaccinated but weigh that against the inconvenience of increased exposure to the virus you're causing everyone else.
(3) Ivermectin and vitamin D and a bunch of other inexpensive drugs are safe and effective ways to combat covid. - you'll have to be more specific how effective. There are definitely good treatments coming out but from what I understand Ivermectin isn't the preferred solution.
(4) Omicron is such a mild disease that it would be far more preferable for healthy people to get Omicron that get the vaccine and potentially end up with debilitating myocarditis, or thrombosis / blood clotting / stroke. - see (2), also note that the vaccine is far more effective at preventing a second infection than a previous infection is
(5) It’s absolutely insane to be vaccinating children against covid - again speak for yourself, my kids are vaccinated, there is no mandate to vaccinate children so do what you like there.
We can agree to disagree on some of this, fat pat. We recorded this podcast on Friday - before Mallard got involved and after I was outside by the protestors when they rallied around and started shouting “shame on you” at a TV reporter trying to do a live cross. It didn’t make me feel great, as I felt that if the angry mob (some of those within it carrying signs with violent messages) knew I was a journalist too, they could turn on me. In saying so, my encounters with protestors have been fine since then. The protest has seen a number of groups represented, so the vibe has taken many forms.
Is this mandate not a legitimate public health policy? If you're not vaccinated you are more likely to be sicker for longer therefore more likely to spread the virus.
This is precisely the reason for the mandate. It's not a nice friendly way to get people vaccinated but it's not holding them down and injecting them.
Yes other countries are removing the mandates but they are far later in their stage of spread. We're still at the stage of very few people having been exposed to it so slowing it down seems a reasonable thing to do?
I guess a question we have to consider for the future is what level of lethality (not sure that's a word) would we draw the line at for compulsory vaccination? 1%? 10%? 20?
What we've got with covid is probably the most mild worldwide pandemic, what if one comes along that's more serious? Surely we're not going to be having these same arguments then?
JA has stated that the mandates will be removed when they're no longer needed - maybe not that clearly but she probably should make that clear. As for putting a date on it - how? Maybe relate it to hospital capacity?
The good news is we have approx. 2,000 deaths saved up due to the lockdowns also preventing people from catching the flu.
Since it is also a stated goal for zero road deaths, there is another 400 per annum we can save to spend on Covid. All we have to do is ban driving to achieve zero road deaths.
It's easy to lower risk to whatever you want if you don't care about other risk factors, the economy, or ironically the quality of life.
Labours motto should be, 'Tiptoeing through life as long and quietly as possible.'
But they might also want to consider, the over 50,000 women who have had cancer screenings deferred, not to mention all the other medical preventive care that has also been deferred.
The tally is not over, and could well be over generations.
200 deaths saved up is a good point. We had a very small, non-eventful flue season in 2020 and 2021. That means there's extra 'fuel load' around, i.e. people who would normally have died of the flu are still alive and will likely die of Covid instead of the flu. Sweden had this in 2020 - its 2019 flu season was very low whereas Denmark and Sweden had really bad seasons, which was an explanatory variable for some of Sweden's Covid deaths.
Journalists seem to be timid and heed more the instructions of the despicable Mallard than finding out the motivation of the protestors. It is precisely situations like this where true journalism shines...
Let's be thirsty for the truth. Blaze ahead like those reporters who stayed in Taliban country to interview the Taliban or cover the US withdrawal. Or those who stayed in China during the Tiananmen crackdown.
Are they interested in showing both sides of the story? Not just the government sanctioned story/narrative? Aren't Kiwis intellectually curious any more? Why are people so quick to shut down and to judge and condemn instead?
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