Paul Henry: GO! NOW!!

SURELY Mediaworks can't protect him any more.

Arrogant. Smug. Bulletproof?

That bigoted arrogant juvenile broadcaster Paul Henry insists he "meant no harm" for making comments about a woman's breasts during an interview.
During an expletive-filled piece, the breakfast TV host said that a woman sitting near him had "perfect tits". But he's adamant "there's absolutely no way the woman could have heard the conversation...I would never want to make anyone feel uncomfortable." Yea...right.
Listen, dickhead, whether the woman could hear you or not is irrelevant. You've (supposedly) got a brain in your overpaid head - even you know you've crossed the line once too often!
At some point the woman put on a jacket - Henry commented that she'd covered them up and "hermetically f***ing sealed them in leather!"
This is the standard sort of childish behaviour and language that the whole country has had to tolerate from Paul Henry for far too many years! It MUST stop!
It's long past time he RESIGNED! He surely has something wrong in his twisted psyche.
Get some treatment...and get off our screens. Once and for all.
Former TVNZ Breakfast host Rawdon Christie said "...(Henry)'s an entertainer. Simple. No need to add oxygen to this – he'll probably be loving the attention." Whether that's true or not, media expert Brian Edwards called the expletive-laden interview a "career wrecking ball".

A spokesman for Mediaworks says the company does not condone offensive behaviour.
So what is Mediaworks going to do about this pillick?

Killers Stalk British Countryside

What many citizens have suspected for some time: leopards and pumas are breeding in rural Britain.

New data shows more than one big cat sighting is being reported to UK police every week! There've been 455 sightings of big cats between 2010-2015. Accounts of a black panther stalking Norfolk and Suffolk have featured regularly in news reports.
Since the UK's Dangerous Wild Animals Act came into law in 1977, people have not been allowed to keep big cats as pets. Many big cat sightings are of animals that were kept as pets and released, or perhaps ones that escaped from zoos or were purposely released into the wild.
But big cats must be breeding, as they don't live 40 years in the wild: puma last 8-13yrs and leopards 12-17yrs. There've also been occasional sightings of females with cubs.

There're an estimated 2,000 sightings each year, the vast majority of which are not reported to UK authorities. Some have been dismissed as hoaxes, however a DNA test on hairs found in Lincolnshire found they did come from the leopard family.
Leopards and pumas in the wild live in countryside quite similar to the UK: there're pumas in North America and leopards as far north as Siberia.
So, given that the existence of these big cats seems no longer in dispute, I wonder what the UK approach will be, when one of them is cornered? Police supposedly liaise with the RSPCA...but these particular cats are somewhat more dangerous than your average stray moggie!
One hopes police sharpshooters won't kill them on sight...but what will the fate of these once-legendary rural stalkers be?

Ice, Ice, Baby...

Confirmation that more than 1,500 metric tons of endangered Icelandic fin whale meat were shipped to Japan in July 2016!

death-carrier Winter Bay

The discovery comes just prior to the 17th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (CoP17) to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), which starts in South Africa today.
The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), OceanCare, Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), Pro Wildlife, and Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) tracked the transport vessel Winter Bay from Iceland, through Russia's Northern Sea Route and on to Japan, suspecting it was carrying whale products from the Hvalur whaling company. The shipment arrived in Osaka on 09 Sept.
As blogged here, Winter Bay shipped over 1,800 metric tons of fin whale products from Iceland to Japan via the same route in 2015.

Whaling vessel Hvalur 9

Hvalur and its director, Kristján Loftsson, are emptying their warehouse of fin whale products, presumably to resume their killing in 2017.
Clare Perry, head of EIA's Oceans Campaign: "There‘s no excuse for Iceland to continue to slaughter whales in violation of the 30-yr. old International Whaling Commission (IWC) commercial whaling moratorium. The international community must tell Loftsson that enough is enough: fin whaling must stop."
Iceland and Norway trade commercially in whale products, under their respective reservations to the listing of great whale species on CITES Appendix I. Since 2008, more than 9,000 metric tons of whale products have been exported by the two countries to Japan and the Faroe Islands.
On 14 Sept., a Norwegian company received an export permit from the Norwegian govt to ship up to 195 metric tons of minke whale meat to Japan. If the shipment goes ahead, it will be the largest single shipment of whale meat from Norway since the IWC moratorium took effect. And Lofothval, a Norwegian whale meat company tied to Iceland's Loftsson, also received an export permit on 15 Sept., to ship up to 4 metric tons of whale meat to Japan. Combined, these shipments equal the meat of 137 minke whales.
These export permits are deeply disturbing, as it appears the companies are whaling almost exclusively for the Japanese market.

Into The Black Heart

Late last month (29 July), Sea Shepherd Captain Jessie Treverton from the UK re-entered the Faroe Islands' capital Tórshavn for the first time since her arrest in 2014.

She returned to demand a court trial and the return of a seized SS vessel.
The procrastinating Faroese prosecutor had yet to set a court date, almost two years after Treverton's Sept.2014 arrest for guiding a large pod of white-sided dolphins away from the killing bays of the Faroe Islands as part of SS's campaign Operation Grindstop. After MV Spitfire steered a large pod of dolphins to safety, the Danish Navy seized the UK-registered vessel and arrested its three crew, charging them with 'failure to report sightings of dolphins to the authorities' under the newly-introduced Grind Law and 'harassing dolphins' in an unprecedented interpretation of Faroese animal welfare legislation.
It seems in the Faroes it's legal to drive and kill an EU-protected cetacean species, but it's illegal to push them back out to sea in order to save them from harm...because that's considered harassment!
Treverton's court case has been postponed numerous times, but she now finally has a court summons for 24 Nov.2016. She believes the lengthy postponement is intentional, because any such trial will have a landmark impact on the traditional drive hunt and slaughter of pilot whales and other dolphins: "I'm looking forward to my court case, to highlight the ridiculous hypocrisy of the grind laws. If I'm found guilty of 'stressing' dolphins, the dolphin hunters can also be charged with that same offence. If I am found innocent, any person will be free to direct dolphins away from the islands to safety. Either way, it's a win for the oceans."
I'll bet when the FI legal beagles twisted the Grind Law around, they hadn't thought of that implication! Opps!

NZ Herald Horror (and I mean it's standards!)

Yesterday (03 Aug.2016) an Emirates Boeing 777-300 crash-landed at Dubai: amazingly all 300 passengers and crew were saved.

I found out about the story when I opened the NZ Herald website today. Note: NOT a newsworthy headline like "All safe after Emirates crash in Dubai" or "Dubai Airport closed by crash" or even "300 saved by Boeing technology" ...no, I was offered a chance to "WATCH terrified passengers inside smoke-filled cabin"!!!
Yeup, in these days when everyone's cellphones make them 'photo-journos', someone FILMED what was nearly their moment of DEATH!
As if that particular action was not 'braindead personified', we were shown confusion, panic, screaming, yelling, every-man-for-himself ...and OMG! In the most crucial 60 seconds of their lives, passengers were opening overhead lockers and getting their cabin bags!
But the 'curdled-cream-on-the-rotting-cake' must surely be NZ Herald's decision to actually run this 'citizen footage' in the first place!
Posting pix of the crash site to support the story is one thing. To stream footage of terrified passengers clawing their way out of a smoke-filled cabin - and call it news - is completely different...and quite frankly piss-poor journalism.
Oh, but then, it's NOT real journalism, is it? It's yet another example of CNN-type sensationalism in the interests of reaping a few more dollars, more of the pathetic NZ Herald non-thoughts such as we've seen over the past few years.
One can only assume the editorial staff were born in the late '90s and bought their journalism qualifications on-line...

All Hail The Happy And Hardy!

In history on 26 July 1903, the first automobile trip across the United States was completed by two happy and hardy gentlemen.
It was America's first transcontinental road trip and, like all hard drives, an unforgettable experience.

Happy and hardy butcher

This year on 26 July, another hard drive...this time in the beautiful Faroe Islands, where it's stunning rugged beauty was once again savagely tarnished by one more bloody and brutal grindadráp.
A pod of approximately 200 long-finned pilot whales was driven by 25 Faroese boats for two hours, before 135 were eventually beached and hacked to death on the rocky shoreline at Hvannasund.
This was the second slaughter of 2016 - the largest so far, following the totally unnecessary deaths of up to 50 pilot whales on 06 July.
In 2015, the "gentlemen" of the Faroes butchered 501 whales - now just one month into 'the season', they're already a third through last year's tally. I hope these hardy gents are happy...

This Time, The Whales Win

A new court ruling, in an ongoing battle between the US Navy and marine wildlife advocates, has come down in favour of marine mammals that're affected by navy sonar.

Sonar, which involves detecting underwater objects using sound waves, is used by whales and dolphins to locate prey or members of their pod. But the human-developed sonar can be harmful to marine mammals and their feeding and mating patterns.
An Appeals Court in California has found a 2012 decision - to allow naval use of low-frequency sonar for training, testing, and operations - was contrary to the US Marine Mammal Protection Act, which states peacetime oceanic programmes must have "the least practicable adverse impact on marine mammals."
Environmentalists have claimed 155 whales and dolphins in certain parts of Southern California and the Hawaiian islands were killed by the US Navy's mid-frequency active sonar and explosives, with estimates for serious injuries in the range of 2,000.
The use of sonar has been shown to cause whales to swim hundreds of miles to escape, change depth so fast that injury is caused, or beach themselves in order to avoid rolling walls of noise that're nearly twice the volume of the loudest rock concert.
This lawsuit by the Natural Resources Defence Council is part of a larger campaign to limit man-made oceanic noises impacting the health, feeding, and breeding patterns for marine mammals. Other examples include sounds caused by shipping vessels and seismic oil and gas drilling.

2016 Grindadráp Begins

In the Northern Hemisphere, it's summer.
A time for family fun in the sun, frolicking at the seaside, running helter-skelter into the waves...and for some Faroe Islanders, hacking trapped pilot whales to death. Their local media confirms up to 50 whales were killed on 06 July.

The pod of pilot whales was initially spotted near Svinoy (an island in the NE of the Faroes), before boats forced them south about 11km onto the killing beach of Hvannasund...Sea Shepherd activists were not present at the grindadráp, as the group has been barred from entering the FI.
The 2015 summer saw 501 whales butchered, 14 SS volunteers from across the globe arrested, and SS's vessel Bob Barker barred "in the interests of maintaining law and order." A new law was brought in, forcing all visitors - not just SS activists - to report sightings of whales to authorities, or face a possible 2yrs.jail.
There were also claims that the navy was involved in preventing protests. As actor Martin Sheen wrote to the Danish PM: "I was appalled to see the Danish Navy being used to defend the killing of hundreds of defenceless pilot whales. Does it really take a frigate, a patrol boat, commando units and a helicopter along with Danish police officers and a Faroese patrol boat to stop a group of compassionate, non-violent people?"
The Faroe Islands govt claims there's no special legislation regarding entry visas for members of Sea Shepherd. But from April 2016, a new executive order allows a Faroese minister to ban foreign vessels if they're expected to "disrupt lawful activities".
As a result, SS has modified its tactics. It's 2016 pilot whale defence campaign Operation Bloody Fjords will take its battle to the heart of the Faroese and Danish institutions that support this bloody dated practice. It plans to pursue a legal complaint in the European Union Parliament, and to promote the boycott of Faroese farm-raised salmon and other fish products.

Kiwi Can't Fly

So which was it?
Did the public not want to fly those routes?
Did the public not trust Ewan Wilson?
Could Ewan Wilson not run a successful airline?

All or none of the above?
Whatever the reason, the fact is: Ewan Wilson's Kiwi Regional Airlines has bellyflopped. Kiwi's scheduled Hamilton-Nelson, Tauranga-Nelson, and Nelson-Dunedin runs cease on 30 July.
The Waikato-based airline was launched in October 2015 by CEO Ewan Wilson, who also founded the failed no-frills trans-Tasman Kiwi International Airlines in 1994.
Aviation commentator Irene King thinks it likely Kiwi Regional was under-capitalised and struggled to build a loyal customer base: "Running a regional operation is really tough. I'm surprised it lasted so long."
Kiwi is selling its only plane, a 34-seat Saab 340, to Air Chathams (which has been operating more than 30 years). It'll run Air Chathams' Whanganui-Auckland service on its air operating certificate until Air Chathams can move the Saab to its own certificate, and Kiwi crew will be employed by Air Chathams from early August.
Wilson says Kiwi had a choice to either expand with a second aircraft, or be absorbed into a larger operator: "From my point of view I'm pleased our aircraft and flight staff will become part of Air Chathams." He says the sale of the Saab was the shareholder's decision. As a minor shareholder he's pleased with the outcome, but as chief executive he's disappointed.
Air Chathams operates five aircraft with scheduled services between the Chatham Islands-Akld, Wgtn-Chch and Whakatane-Akld.
Wilson says he'd like to continue in the aviation sector - "I've built an airline over the last 14 months that's met probably one of the worlds' toughest regulatory requirements." - but it's too early to say whether he'd consider running another airline.
Third time lucky, Ewan?
Or coals to Newcastle?

Give 'Em A Big Hand, Folks!

Oh Jenny, what HAVE you done now?
A new "thing" adorns the roof of the Christchurch Art Gallery. Quasi is a 5m-tall sculpture by local artist Ronnie van Hout, standing above the Gloucester/Montreal intersection until the end of 2017.

It's quite simply a giant hand with a face. Yeup, that's it... and we have to tolerate it for 18 months!
This sculpture was commissioned by the gallery and funded from its annual exhibitions budget. Someone in their infinite arty-farty wisdom thought Quasi would be really really culturally wonderous! And paid for it to be made! Seriously???!!!
I quote gallery director Jenny Harper from Aug.2014: "I'm utterly clear that good art really matters. I'm convinced that collections of art matter more than a single work or that of a single individual." So Jenny, what the HELL is that up on your roof then?
At the very least, it's a public eyesore!
At worst, it's a blatant abuse of public funds!
In a Press poll of approx.2300 votes, 50% said Quasi was "terrible", 30% said "awesome" and 20% had mixed feelings.
Van Hout says Quasi is a surreal gesture: "I'm not trying to tell people something. Often art does, but this is more like a surrealist artwork. A way of making art by juxtaposing things together..." he says.
A way of pocketing a big paycheck, I say.
Gallery director Jenny Harper says the sculpture will prompt varied reactions. "I think some people will be startled...affronted...they might say: 'Is this art?' I'm damn sure kids will love it." Riiiiiight!!!
And do kids pay rates to keep you employed, Jen-Jen darlink?

...meanwhile the patronising multi-coloured neon phrase along the opposite wall of the Art Gallery - Everything's Going To Be All Right - is looking decidely tongue-in-cheek these days, with a couple of the letters blown out!

Bound To Happen!

A British Airways Airbus carrying 137 people has been struck by a drone, on final approach to London's Heathrow Airport, sparking major concerns over air safety.
In what's believed to be the first time a drone has hit a commercial plane in British airspace, an Airbus A320 from Geneva was minutes away from landing at Heathrow when it was hit on the nose - the aircraft landed safely.
Metropolitan Police detectives are investigating the strike, which follows a string of near-misses in recent months in British airspace: a recent report found 23 near-misses between drones and aircraft between April-October last year.
Pilots warn that drones, which are too small to appear on radar, could destroy an airliner's engine or smash a cockpit windscreen.

Toys that can kill...

Hundreds of thousands of drones have been purchased around the world in the past few years, and can be operated without a licence, as long as they're not used for commercial purposes.
High-end drones can fly up to/beyond 2,000m, travel up to 80kmph and stay in the air for 25 minutes, so it was only a matter of time before some fuckwit decided it might be fun to try and smack into a plane. These dorks would be from the same gene pool as those neanderthals who think it's entertaining to dazzle a pilot with a laser.
With drone sales going sky-high, and regulations playing a (rather slow) catch-up, a crash caused by a drone is bound to happen soon.

Selling Off Canterbury Water

The news leaked out earlier this week: a council in the middle of the drought-prone Canterbury plains is selling the right to extract 40 billion litres of pure artesian water to a bottled water supplier.

Am I missing something?
Ashburton District Council is selling off a section (called Lot 9) with a valuable resource consent, that allows the taking of water from aquifers beneath the town.
Not at all surprisingly, the council is staying mum on the deal (understood to be with an overseas company interested in setting up a water-bottling plant), and won't say how much dosh it'll be making. But you can bet, if it's prepared to face public wrath over such an horrendous deal, it'll be pocketing a pretty penny!
The buyer will be able to to take 45L of water a second from local aquifers, totalling more than 1.4 billion litres a year!
With the consent valid until 2046, the buyer will be able to suck out 40 billion+ litres of Ashburton's water.
The Ashburton groundwater zone is over-allocated, meaning water allocated to consent holders exceeds the amount available for use.
The area's heavy crop cultivation means demand for existing water is heavy. The district often has issues supplying water during summer. In some areas, residents are banned from using hoses to water their gardens.
But wait! Back in 2011, when applying for the consent, the council struck a deal with meat processor Silver Fern Farms, allowing it to deepen its bore if Lot 9's water take caused groundwater levels to reduce. Yeup, so New Player can heavily impact existing water table to the tune of 40 billion+ litres. Then Existing Player can suck off even MORE water, if New Player effects it too much!
Oh, and BTW, there's been no public consultation about the deal. Surprise-surprise! And yet this under-cover sale is expected to be finalised in June!
This whole deal smells despicable, and surely needs to be paused for due process!! And quite frankly, does the world need yet ANOTHER bottled water label???!

Norway Feeds Minke Meat to Mink

So few people in Norway eat whale meat that it ends up in animal feed on fur farms!
As well as being one of only three countries continuing to whale, Norway has a thriving fur industry. Last year, it exported 258 tons of fox skins and 1,000 tons of mink skins to the EU.
According to a report by the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), a UK-based nonprofit, and the US-based Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), more than 113 metric tons of minke whale products — that's about 75 whales — were bought or used by

Rogaland Pelsdyrfôrlaget, the largest manufacturer of animal feed for Norway's fur industry.
It details that, in 2014, the company bought or used 113,700 kgs (or 125 tons) of whale product, which could include meat and blubber.
There is little demand for whale meat in Norway, and consumption fell to about .25kg of meat per person per year (2000, Whale and Dolphin Conservation). Norway has increased its whale meat exports to Japan in recent years in defiance of an international ban. However, the EIA and AWI revealed last year that Japan rejected imports of Norwegian whale meat, when tests revealed high levels of pesticides.
Jennifer Lonsdale, EIA director: "The Norwegian government claims it's important to have whale meat as a source of food for people, but because of falling demand, the product is now being exported. Now we discover it's going to feed animals in the fur industry, which we find completely unacceptable."

Norway's self-issued quota for 2016 was for about 880 whales, down from 1,286 in 2015. But the International Whaling Commission (IWC) has criticised it for not being conservation-minded enough. In 2001, the IWC called on Norway to stop hunting and trading whales, but Norway insists it's a tradition that needs to be protected.
Minke whales in the North Atlantic, where Norway hunts, are not considered to be at-risk, but conservationists and animal welfare activists say the hunts are cruel and unnecessary, given the low demand for whale meat.

- Source: National Geographic's Special Investigations Unit,
which focuses on wildlife crime.

The Butchers Are Back

The blatant flauting of international law by the nasty Nippons concluded last week.

Daddy-san's home!

Japan's Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR) announced its whaling fleet had killed 333 minke whales since the end of last year in the name of "research". That proudly-announced figure tragically included 200 pregnant whales.
ICR also revealed where its hunts had been carried out: many of the whales were slaughtered in the Australian Whale Sanctuary and the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.
It is ironic that neither Australia nor New Zealand would provide any intelligence support, to help eco-warriors Sea Shepherd locate the Japanese whaling fleet. Neither would they mobilise any vessel to watch the whalers. Yet the illegal butchering of these sentient creatures mostly happened within striking distance of their coasts, and within each country's jurisdiction!

Oh, for sure, as soon as the bloody tally hit the headlines, each country's Foreign Ministers denounced the ICR's efforts... but of what use is that?
It is obvious to all that Japan's new "scientific" research scheme is yet another thinly-disguised hunting trip. Like those before, it too was rejected by the International Whaling Commission's scientific committee. Yet the arrogant Japanese went ahead anyway, knowing that the very countries spearheading the anti-whaling campaign valued the Nippon trading dollars more, than to follow through with what the majority of their voters wanted.
Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson: "Japan simply ignores international law and international opinion, and continues to slaughter whales with impunity, selling their flesh for a profit. Nearly two years have passed since the International Court of Justice ruled Japan's commercial whaling program illegal, and yet the whalers are still announcing hundreds of fresh kills, including of pregnant mothers."
SS's reason for not sending a full fleet into the Sthrn Ocean this season to block whaling efforts, was because it had a big legal campaign underway against the whalers. And it was the Japanese who actually made this possible - by suing SS in US federal court in 2011. That gave SS a unique opportunity to hold the whalers accountable under US law. So SS has counterclaimed, to prevent the whalers from continuing their violent attacks on SS vessels, and to force them to pay damages for past attacks.
In the meantime, this year's whaling season was a profound success for the ICR, and a pause in the fight for SS. It should also be an embarrassment for Australia and New Zealand. But do their governments really care? I think not...

Wicked Campers Still Don't Get It

NZ's Department of Conservation (DOC) has joined a targeted assault against controversial campervan hire company Wicked Campers.
Wicked (which started in Oz and operates in NZ) is under fire from Associate Tourism Minister Paula Bennett for highly offensive slogans and imagery painted on its vehicles.
DOC has removed Wicked Campers from a list of rental companies, where tourists can buy a DOC campsite pass. A spokesman for Conservation Minister Maggie Barry says: "The ministers find these slogans sleazy, misogynistic and offensive."

Wicked Campers has a long history of hitting the headlines on both sides of the Tasman for all the wrong reasons:
March 2016 - Popular Nelson campsite Kaiteriteri Recreation Reserve banned Wicked Campers from their site, saying the vehicles' messages were inappropriate for the families staying there.
Feb.2016 - Whangarei District Council threatened to prosecute Wicked Campers if its campervans with offensive or objectionable material on them were found in the district.
Jan.2016 - NZ's Advertising Standards Authority upheld a complaint about a van slogan saying "The best thing about oral sex is the five minutes of silence." The board said the quote was deliberately provocative and offensive, was likely to cause serious and widespread offence to most people, and "had not been prepared with...social responsibility to consumers and society".
2015 - travel guide Lonely Planet said it would remove Wicked Campers from its NZ/Oz guidebooks because of its vans' offensive slogans.
2014 - Wicked Campers agreed to review a van featuring a witch passing a meth pipe to Snow White, after a police complaint.
NZ Police has joined the public campaign against Wicked Camper vans, but acknowledge it's a complex issue from a law enforcement perspective: "A message may be widely regarded as offensive and inappropriate, but this does not necessarily make it a criminal matter." The chief censor's office says for a publication to be banned, it has to have done "injury to the public good", instead of just being offensive.

Convictions for knowingly possessing objectionable material can result in a fine up to $50,000 or a 10 year prison sentence.
Meanwhile Associate Tourism Minister Paula Bennett wants the public to send her photos of all four sides of Wicked's vans: paula.bennett@parliament.govt.nz.
.

Viking's Fiery End

An illegal toothfish fishing vessel, pursued by several countries, has been blown-up by the Indonesian Navy.
Viking was one of six illegal and unregulated fishing vessels plundering toothfish in the Southern Ocean, and was the last to be apprehended. Sea Shepherd, which helped track these vessels, called them the 'Bandit 6'.

Fishing in the Southern Ocean is banned by an international convention to conserve Antarctic marine life.
Viking was apprehended in Indonesian waters and blown up by the Indonesian Navy and the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries on Monday 18th. The crew was being detained in Indonesia.
New Zealand's pacific fisheries ambassador, Shane Jones, says the dramatic way in which the vessels had been driven out of business would "certainly put a dent in the business of illegal fishing."
Viking was a stateless vessel, falsely claiming to be flagged under Nigeria. The nationalities of the Viking's crew are not known.
In December, NZ authorities patrolling the Southern Ocean captured video and still footage of illegal vessels, and provided crew lists to other countries involved in the crackdown.
Jones said the most worrying prospect for the fishing industry was now a largely-unregulated fleet of more than 3000 longline fishing vessels operating just north of the Kermadec Islands.
NZ authorities had been working with a range of countries for the past year to capture the six vessels and their crews. Vast amounts of time and resources had been spent on pursuing them, but it is unknown how much it had cost NZ taxpayers.

Hide and Seek

Environmental group Sea Shepherd can't find the nasty Nippon whaling fleet in the vast Southern Ocean, and is urging the Ozzie govt to help.

Its ship Steve Irwin left Western Australia on 18 Jan., to disrupt the annual hunt. SS says the whalers have greatly expanded their area of operations in the Southern Ocean, and this makes finding them very difficult.
Japan maintains it's trying to prove the whale population is big enough to sustain a return to commercial hunting, and says it has to kill the mammals to carry out its 'scientific research' properly.
Australia - leading global efforts to persuade Japan to halt whaling - has previously floated the idea of sending a customs vessel to monitor the hunt, but there's been no follow-through.
SS's Paul Watson: "SS was expecting that Oz or NZ would uphold their obligations as responsible members of the International Whaling Commission, to send a ship to intercept the Japanese whaling fleet. This does not seem to be something Australia or New Zealand are willing to do." He's calling for them to provide SS with the exact

"What? You expect me to be actually do my job???"

coordinates of the fleet.
Oz Environment Minister Greg Hunt is non-committal on the suggestion: "We do not accept...the concept of killing whales for so-called 'scientific research'. We will continue to urge Japan to pursue non-lethal methods of research and end its unnecessary whaling programme. Australia is committed to the protection of whales and we will continue to work with the international community to promote whale conservation and uphold the global moratorium on commercial whaling."
As you can see, he's saying nothing at all. And if you're expecting anything better from NZ Foreign Affairs Munster "Womble" McCully...think again. He can't even say ANYTHING on the subject... let alone anything of substance!
It appears as if, once again, the people's elected representatives sit comfortably in their ivory towers doing nothing, while the people's eco-warriors struggle on their own...

Give Him What He Wants

A teenage thrill-seeker has risked his life, jail AND an historic icon - by scaling the Great Pyramid of Cheops, at Giza!
It's illegal to climb the 4,500yr.old landmark, but 18yr.old German tourist Andrej Ciesielski decided he knew better, so flew to Cairo with the express intention of doing just that.
Ciesielski reached the top of the 146m structure in eight minutes in broad daylight: "I'd asked locals what they thought of my plan and they warned me it was illegal, but I thought it would be fine, what with Egypt's dependence on tourists. I was told I risked prison, but on balance I thought the photos would be worth it."
The rules against climbing the pyramids are in place to protect them from human damage, and it is an act punishable by up to 3yrs in Egyptian prison: "After a few minutes' climbing, I started to attract a bit of attention, and security guards shouted to me in Arabic to come down..." Oh, really? What a surprise!
The prize prat does this sort of thing for thrills. He accesses high-rise rooftops around the world, clambering into precarious positions just for the buzz, with no concept of the illegality or risk!

So if this inconsiderate fool was prepared to knowingly risk jail for those pix, then LET HIM HAVE IT! Delete all his photographs, take away his freedom for the maximum sentence...and make an example of him for other idiots!
The world has lost far too much heritage over the last few decades, through terrorism, earthquakes and other natural disasters. We do not need selfish fuckwits like Ciesielski damaging what's left: "I wanted to experience Egyptian culture and I definitely managed that."
Now his next experience of Egypt should be 3yrs in a Cairo cell!

Ozzies: Send In Some Muscle!

Australians are overwhelmingly in favour of their govt monitoring Japanese whaling in the Southern Ocean.
A Morgan poll finds 76.9% of 1,002 people want a Customs ship to monitor Japanese whaling.

The Coalition had previously been accused of backing off a pre-election commitment to tackle whaling in the Southern Ocean, after refusing to send the specialist Customs patrol vessel Ocean Protector, and instead sending aircraft to monitor the hunt.
Greens senator Nick McKim said the Coalition was backing away from the monitoring commitment made in opposition, and PM Malcolm Turnbull had refused to express anything stronger than "disappointment" about whaling on his recent visit to Japan.
The poll comes at the end of a fraught year on the whaling issue, in which Japanese whaling company Kyodo Senpaku was fined $1m for wilful contempt of the Australian federal court, after breaching an order to stop killing whales.
The decision to resume whaling also flies in the face of a 2014 international court of justice (ICJ) ruling saying the programme had no basis in science and should be halted.
A spokesman for environment minister, Greg Hunt, said: "The govt has made representations at the highest level to urge Japan not to resume whaling and we will continue to do so. We will also continue our efforts in the International Whaling Commission (IWC) to strongly oppose commercial whaling, and to promote whale conservation."
However in 2013 when in opposition, Hunt strongly supported having a Customs vessel in the Southern Ocean...

TV3 News Now One-Dimensional

This week, tears flowed on-screen as Mediaworks axed yet another

investigative tv programme.
The demise of TV3's 3D was announced earlier this month with parent company Mediaworks saying long-form current affairs "is challenging to make commercially viable...and given the way media consumption habits are changing, unfortunately continuing 3D may not be possible".
During the final show, reporter Sarah Hall remarked: "This type of storytelling is so important to us as a country. I truly hope that somehow, some way, programmes like ours will still find a place, because without them, these stories are going to be lost." The end of 3D follows the widely-bagged axing of Campbell Live earlier this year.
In a statement, the broadcaster said it was now working with staff on "redeployment opportunities" but wouldn't give a number of how many staff are affected.
Media comentator Brian Edwards says Mediaworks' conscious shift into tabloid-style reality tv is something it's been consistently open about: "In my opinion, they don't seem to be dedicated to public service broadcasting or current affairs... at the end of the day, it comes down to generating revenue and profit."
Media blogger Martyn Bradbury writes that TV3 should 'come out', admit it's right-wing, and "end this facade of fourth estate accountability."
A Mediaworks spokesman says news and current affairs remain a priority for TV3 and points out it's invested heavily in Story, Paul Henry and Newsworthy to reflect that. A pity then, that these programmes seem decidedly NOT newsworthy...