Eleanor Howden

YouTube video by thejuicemedia Honest Government Ad | Visit New Zealand!

The Government of New Zealand has made a new tourism ad and it's surprsingly honest and informative!

More good work by Greg Sargent

Listen to Jane Goodall’s final — and urgent — message Her last interviews are essential listening for everyone.

Jane Goodall final message
The pernicious idea that economic development should come before the environment. In reality, we’re on a planet with finite resources, and if we exhaust them, it could spell our own end
“Humans are not exempt from extinction,”

www.vox.com/climate/4634...

An ‘election changing’ 55,000 votes could be barred under controversial new law The Government’s changes to voting laws will see a 400% increase in “disallowed” votes, the Electoral Commission says.

The Government's controversial voting law will result in a 411% increase in the number of votes being thrown out, according to the Electoral Commission.

www.thepost.co.nz/politics/360...

“We are told by leaders that we are the future. But when it comes to the ongoing pandemic, our present is being stolen right in front of our eyes.”

Incredible speech by Violet Affleck who warned about the ongoing dangers of COVID & Long Covid, & advocated for masks and clean air at the UN today!

This is not good policy, nor targeted spending. It’s just a press release trying to distract people from the very real problems in health. Our health system needs real solutions and real funding - to properly support health workers across Aotearoa. Not more spin.

Rather than pretend $20m is going to make any difference (it represents 0.06% of health funding), the Minister could recognise the government underfunded health to begin with. He could pay nurses and doctors properly - rather than fight them.

New series from @EmpirePodUK
THE HISTORY OF GAZA

291. Ancient Gaza: The Philistines
Empire – Apple Podcasts share.google/7fne19kFfVLw...

It's a very dangerous moment in history when the US VP, and a man who is likely to become POTUS, tells such lies.

The greatest deaths in a mass shooting was the Utoya massacre of young people attending a summer socialist camp, by the right wing lunatic Anders Breivik. Then the NZ mass shooting.
1/4

Highway filled with cars

Wide urban arterial filled with cars

Wide one-way street in a downtown filled with cars

Highway filled with cars

Bike-lanes don’t cause traffic congestion.

Car dependency, foolish land-use sprawl, too many (& bigger) cars driving too much taking up too much space, highly subsidized driving costs, and not enough choices in how to get around, ALL cause traffic congestion.

Think about it. THAT’S common sense.

Privatisation of UK industries is driving cost of living crisis, says Greens leader Zack Polanski calls mass privatisation a ‘failed experiment’ as report finds it has cost UK households £250 a year more

Privatisation of UK industries driving cost of living crisis & inequality.

People ripped off by water, energy, rail, mail companies.

Profiteering at care homes, dentists, GP surgeries, cataract clinics. Social housing destroyed.

Privatisation is a scam. Delivered low investment, poor service.

Humanity started to change Earth’s atmosphere about 6,000 year ago!

This graph visualizes the total annual greenhouse gas forcings, aerosol forcings and the net effects of both.

It also includes NASA CERES satellite observation based Earth's Energy Imbalance and how it changed:

There's no way to say this without sounding like an ecofascist (which I'm not), but humans are responsible for species extinction. It's good to get rid of invasive species that we brought, but we should also address climate change, habitat loss, overexploitation, pollution, and disease.

An aggressive, militant political culture has spread. It provides fertile ground for political violence, which has been rising and comes overwhelmingly from the Right.

And no one has contributed more to this distinctly dangerous political culture than the leaders of the Right.

Systematic attribution of heatwaves to the emissions of carbon majors - Nature Climate change made 213 historical heatwaves reported over 2000–2023 more likely and more intense, to which each of the 180 carbon majors (fossil fuel and cement producers) substantially contributed.

🚨 Important paper in Nature: "Systematic attribution of heatwaves to the emissions of carbon majors".

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Invisible and ignored: Why indoor air quality deserves our attention Polluted indoor air is a hidden threat, linked to illness, lost productivity, and preventable deaths. Aotearoa New Zealand needs a coordinated national strategy to make clean, safe indoor air the norm...

Poor indoor air costs NZ around $1 billion a year in healthcare and lost productivity. Investing in clean air is good for health and the economy. #indoorairquality www.phcc.org.nz/briefing/inv...

Amazon to Invest $4.4 Billion in New Zealand Data Centers Amazon has formally launched cloud services in New Zealand and dusted off a plan first announced in 2021 to invest more than NZ$7.5 billion ($4.4 billion) in data centers in the South Pacific nation.

Funny to see New Zealand’s prime minister try to take credit for a plan announced four years ago then delayed by Amazon.

I find it hard to believe Amazon’s figures, but even more than that it’s wild to see the fanfare over greater dependence on US cloud firms in light of Trump and the CLOUD Act.

bad news for countries still hitching their carts to expanding fossil fuel production

Collapse of critical Atlantic current is no longer low-likelihood, study finds Scientists say ‘shocking’ discovery shows rapid cuts in carbon emissions are needed to avoid catastrophic fallout

The collapse of the Amoc would have devastating consequences for food security. This is not just an environmental issue, it’s a humanitarian catastrophe.

Collapse of critical Atlantic current is no longer low-likelihood, study finds www.theguardian.com/environment/...

The Cochrane library is a global source of independent health evidence for everyone – why is NZ restricting access? New Zealanders download Cochrane Library health reviews daily. Restricting access is a step back to when medical knowledge was held tightly by professionals.

Another way government austerity is failing healthcare and the NZ people. Underfunded Te Whatu Ora / Health NZ is cutting access to the Cochrane Library, a gold standard source of information to support health decision-making. NZers use it 246 times per day. #nzpol

tinyurl.com/3jya8hkd

Amid international outrage, Israel is now claiming the double-tap strike on Nasser hospital was an accident—after celebrating it in Hebrew media.

Drunk on their own impunity they take us all for fools. They mock humanity itself. Hell is not hot enough for these monsters.

A mayor confronts the ‘ungodly’ price of three waters reform The political battle over three waters is over, but the financial wreckage is just beginning.

Three waters has become a financial disaster for some councils. I spoke to a five-term mayor who says it has wrecked his council and the current reforms appear to be failing www.thepress.co.nz/nz-news/3607...

YouTube video by Climate Emergency Forum Dr. Hansen's Climate Warning: It's Worse Than We Thought

Dr Hansen’s Climate Warning

It’s worse than we thought. Seeing the forest for the trees.

YouTube video by opascaud Brent Toderian on sustainable mobility

WATCH THIS: This is quite possibly still the most comprehensive interview I’ve ever done on smart urban transportation for better cities. Filmed in Vienna for a planned Paris-based documentary. Watch it, quote it, and please help spread it around. Thanks!

The UK’s year of climate U-turns exposes a deeper failure Breaking free of the dangerous pretence that current efforts suffice demands a fundamental rethink of the UK’s climate policy consensus.

New piece on Carbon Colonialism, net-zero nonsense, and how the UK Government's climate advisors (and many experts) shy away from speaking truth to power. We need a fundamental reboot of climate policy; - physics doesn't care about political sensibilities. theconversation.com/the-uks-year...

Submission Sunday: Local Government Bill The Bill might be boringly titled, but the content strips out protections, accessibility, and inclusion requirements – which is deeply concerning long-term.

The Local Govt Bill might sound dull but it’s anything but.

It strips out councils’ responsibility for wellbeing, accessibility & inclusion. That means fewer safe footpaths, fewer inclusive playgrounds, fewer spaces where disabled people can belong.

Read more: open.substack.com/pub/drbex/p/...

‘A climate of unparalleled malevolence’: are we on our way to the sixth major mass extinction? The long read: Churning quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at the rate we are going could lead the planet to another Great Dying

It bears repeating: choosing to double down and accelerate our burning of fossil fuels will kill off a substantial proportion of humanity

That is something we want to avoid - and can choose to avoid

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

A Hollow Act What remains of Jacinda Ardern’s “groundbreaking” climate law?

To quantify the policy shift in my story on the Zero Carbon Act today I dug through multiple reports, addenda, and leaned on the Parliamentary Library - trying to track what’s happening. I’ve put some links to the key documents here open.substack.com/pub/kirstyjo...