Friday, April 22, 2005
The report on Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) in NZ has just been released by the Institute of Environmental Science and Research Ltd. (The report has not been picked up yet by the media.) It reinforces that STIs are at epidemic level in this country. Some major points:
• Young people remain at high risk of STIs, with those aged less than 24 years having the highest rates of chlamydia, gonorrhoea, genital herpes and genital warts diagnosed at Sexual Health Clinics.
• There were 46 cases of syphilis reported in 2004, an increase of 53% from 2003.
• Chlamydia trachomatis infection is the most commonly diagnosed STI in New Zealand.
• From 2000 to 2004 the number of confirmed chlamydia and gonorrhoea cases diagnosed at SHCs has increased by 28.2% and 44.4% respectively. There were 4 061 chlamydia cases in 2004 at SHCs, and 445 at Student & Youth Health Clinics.
Chlamydia may now be the most common communicable disease in New Zealand after influenza-like illness.
The number of STI cases reported through the clinic-based surveillance system underestimates the true burden of disease in New Zealand. A comparison of clinic-based and laboratory data for areas where both are collected has been made. This indicated that the incidence of chlamydia is three times higher than that reported from clinics and twice as high for gonorrhoea.
First the thought police - now the art police. Tariana Turia wants to twink out the pipe being smoked by a Maori in a famous Goldie painting. She says the elder never smoked, and the painting has created an image between Maori and smoking which is hard to displace. Seeing just about every artist in history has juxtaposed elements that were never in the same vicinity, or artistically "arranged" their relationship - the Mona Lisa, and Constable's "The Haywain" for starters - where do we stop? Art galleries had better start frisking visitors for Twink bottles.
How come the clients of underage prostitutes are not being prosecuted, asks ECPAT and Stop Demand Foundation? They point out that this week's report “The Nature and Extent of the Sex Industry in New Zealand” cites Police claims that some 210 children under the age of 18 years were identified as selling sex, with three-quarters being concentrated in one Police District. It is illegal under the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 to use in prostitution persons under the age of 18 years. Police know who these people are - why are they not being prosecuted?
Tax freedom day for New Zealand this year is April 24, the BRT calculates. That's two days later than last year. Tax freedom day in the US was last Sunday, April 17.
"We've allowed our heroes to be melted into victims. We've allowed honour and courage and character to languish. We've allowed rights to reign and responsibilities to be ignored. We've allowed the contemptible to be tolerated and the despicable exonerated on the basis of some socio-cultural matrix that makes everything nobody's fault." Jim Hopkins gets serious, and makes some good points.
Hurrah! Don has taken up the cudgels on my behalf! The National Party Leader has announced that National will repeal provisions in Labour's new building legislation that stop New Zealanders from carrying out DIY renovations on their own homes.
A new study of mainstream media bias in the USA has gone farther than just pointing out a leftward tilt — it's quantified just how often reporters turn to liberal sources for their stories. But the report, "A Measure of Media Bias," also reveals some facts that run contrary to popular perception. UCLA political science professor Tim Groseclose, and his associate, University of Missouri professor Jeff Milyo, tracked the references used by reporters in their stories. The research shows that reporters and members of Congress, depending on their politics, tend to quote the same sources, predominately liberal. There were some surprises, however. For instance, you might think The Wall Street Journal is conservative. But "We found that the news articles of The Wall Street Journal were just about as liberal as 'CBS Evening News' or the New York Times," Grossclose said. "Fox News with Brit Hume" and the Washington Times are in a dead-heat for most conservative. The study can be found online at www.polisci.ucla.edu/faculty/groseclose/Media.Bias.8.htm
• Young people remain at high risk of STIs, with those aged less than 24 years having the highest rates of chlamydia, gonorrhoea, genital herpes and genital warts diagnosed at Sexual Health Clinics.
• There were 46 cases of syphilis reported in 2004, an increase of 53% from 2003.
• Chlamydia trachomatis infection is the most commonly diagnosed STI in New Zealand.
• From 2000 to 2004 the number of confirmed chlamydia and gonorrhoea cases diagnosed at SHCs has increased by 28.2% and 44.4% respectively. There were 4 061 chlamydia cases in 2004 at SHCs, and 445 at Student & Youth Health Clinics.
Chlamydia may now be the most common communicable disease in New Zealand after influenza-like illness.
The number of STI cases reported through the clinic-based surveillance system underestimates the true burden of disease in New Zealand. A comparison of clinic-based and laboratory data for areas where both are collected has been made. This indicated that the incidence of chlamydia is three times higher than that reported from clinics and twice as high for gonorrhoea.
First the thought police - now the art police. Tariana Turia wants to twink out the pipe being smoked by a Maori in a famous Goldie painting. She says the elder never smoked, and the painting has created an image between Maori and smoking which is hard to displace. Seeing just about every artist in history has juxtaposed elements that were never in the same vicinity, or artistically "arranged" their relationship - the Mona Lisa, and Constable's "The Haywain" for starters - where do we stop? Art galleries had better start frisking visitors for Twink bottles.
How come the clients of underage prostitutes are not being prosecuted, asks ECPAT and Stop Demand Foundation? They point out that this week's report “The Nature and Extent of the Sex Industry in New Zealand” cites Police claims that some 210 children under the age of 18 years were identified as selling sex, with three-quarters being concentrated in one Police District. It is illegal under the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 to use in prostitution persons under the age of 18 years. Police know who these people are - why are they not being prosecuted?
Tax freedom day for New Zealand this year is April 24, the BRT calculates. That's two days later than last year. Tax freedom day in the US was last Sunday, April 17.
"We've allowed our heroes to be melted into victims. We've allowed honour and courage and character to languish. We've allowed rights to reign and responsibilities to be ignored. We've allowed the contemptible to be tolerated and the despicable exonerated on the basis of some socio-cultural matrix that makes everything nobody's fault." Jim Hopkins gets serious, and makes some good points.
Hurrah! Don has taken up the cudgels on my behalf! The National Party Leader has announced that National will repeal provisions in Labour's new building legislation that stop New Zealanders from carrying out DIY renovations on their own homes.
A new study of mainstream media bias in the USA has gone farther than just pointing out a leftward tilt — it's quantified just how often reporters turn to liberal sources for their stories. But the report, "A Measure of Media Bias," also reveals some facts that run contrary to popular perception. UCLA political science professor Tim Groseclose, and his associate, University of Missouri professor Jeff Milyo, tracked the references used by reporters in their stories. The research shows that reporters and members of Congress, depending on their politics, tend to quote the same sources, predominately liberal. There were some surprises, however. For instance, you might think The Wall Street Journal is conservative. But "We found that the news articles of The Wall Street Journal were just about as liberal as 'CBS Evening News' or the New York Times," Grossclose said. "Fox News with Brit Hume" and the Washington Times are in a dead-heat for most conservative. The study can be found online at www.polisci.ucla.edu/faculty/groseclose/Media.Bias.8.htm
The elderly population in every US state will grow faster than the total population, and seniors will outnumber school-age children in 10 states in the next 25 years, population projections released today by the Census Bureau indicate. The Bureau predicts that 26 states will double their populations of people older than 65 by 2030.
Spain's lower house of parliament, the Congress, has approved legislation that would allow same-sex couples to marry and to adopt children, a move supporters said would make Spanish laws on gays and lesbians among the most liberal in Europe. The law has still to be ratified in the Senate, but that appears a foregone conclusion.
Women whose babies are prenatally diagnosed with Down syndrome report that "their obstetricians had failed to provide enough up-to-date printed material" and "felt rushed or pressured into making a decision about continuing the pregnancy." The study of mothers whose children have Down syndrome was published in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Tail-out: Three graduate students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology developed a computer program that generates fake research papers loaded with ridiculous gobbledygook -- and got one of the resulting papers accepted at a conference.
Thursday, April 21, 2005
School suspension figures for last year are slightly down on 2003 and the trend shows a steady reduction, says the Government. There were 4774 suspensions last year, compared with 4885 in 2003. Associate Education Minister David Benson-Pope says suspension cases appear to involve a very small fraction of school students - close to half of 1 per cent. He said suspensions were concentrated in a small number of schools - less than 3 per cent of schools were responsible for 43 per cent of suspensions.
Eat your heart out Dr Don - in the USA you can actually debate the merits of school choice. The Heritage Foundation has launched a new School Choice website.
Pokie numbers will be slashed, porn magazines will be pushed behind the counter and tolls could be scrapped from the Scoresby link if Australia's Family First party gets the balance of power in next year's state election. The fledging party has laid out its vision for the state.
Same-sex civil unions have become law in Connecticut, after Republican Governor M. Jodi Rell signed landmark legislation making Connecticut the first state to recognize same-sex civil unions without court pressure.
Meanwhile, Americans appear to be more negative towards same-sex marriage. Support for an amendment to the US Constitution that would define marriage as "being between a man and a woman, thus barring marriages between gay or lesbian couples," has risen to 57% in a recent Gallup Poll. This is the highest measured across seven times the question has been asked using this wording since the summer of 2003. About two-thirds of Americans also believe more generally that same-sex marriages should not be recognized by law as valid.
Dozens of US Episcopal parishes have broken off from the national denomination since an openly homosexual priest was elevated as bishop in 2003.
There are hundreds of articles about the new Pope on the internet. But this one in Christianity Today is short, yet gives a penetrating look at what sort of person Benedict XVI is, and what we might expect from his papacy.
Tail-out: By the time Cardinal Ratzinger assumed the papacy on Tuesday, it was already too late for the Vatican to buy the corresponding dot-com Web address. A Florida man, Rogers Cadenhead, registered the address BenedictXVI.com on April 1. To cover his bases, Cadenhead also registered ClementXV.com, InnocentXIV.com, LeoXIV.com, PaulVII.com, and PiusXIII.com.
Eat your heart out Dr Don - in the USA you can actually debate the merits of school choice. The Heritage Foundation has launched a new School Choice website.
Pokie numbers will be slashed, porn magazines will be pushed behind the counter and tolls could be scrapped from the Scoresby link if Australia's Family First party gets the balance of power in next year's state election. The fledging party has laid out its vision for the state.
Same-sex civil unions have become law in Connecticut, after Republican Governor M. Jodi Rell signed landmark legislation making Connecticut the first state to recognize same-sex civil unions without court pressure.
Meanwhile, Americans appear to be more negative towards same-sex marriage. Support for an amendment to the US Constitution that would define marriage as "being between a man and a woman, thus barring marriages between gay or lesbian couples," has risen to 57% in a recent Gallup Poll. This is the highest measured across seven times the question has been asked using this wording since the summer of 2003. About two-thirds of Americans also believe more generally that same-sex marriages should not be recognized by law as valid.
Dozens of US Episcopal parishes have broken off from the national denomination since an openly homosexual priest was elevated as bishop in 2003.
There are hundreds of articles about the new Pope on the internet. But this one in Christianity Today is short, yet gives a penetrating look at what sort of person Benedict XVI is, and what we might expect from his papacy.
Tail-out: By the time Cardinal Ratzinger assumed the papacy on Tuesday, it was already too late for the Vatican to buy the corresponding dot-com Web address. A Florida man, Rogers Cadenhead, registered the address BenedictXVI.com on April 1. To cover his bases, Cadenhead also registered ClementXV.com, InnocentXIV.com, LeoXIV.com, PaulVII.com, and PiusXIII.com.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Men could be forced to undergo DNA testing to see if they are a child's parent under a rejig of parenthood laws proposed by the Law Commission. The proposed changes, which aim to define and clarify the legal role of parent, would also extend a presumption of parenthood to men in a wider range of relationships than is currently the case and tighten up the law around surrogacy and in vitro fertilisation. The proposals are included in a report titled New Issues in Legal Parenthood, tabled in Parliament this morning.
The chief executive of the Families Commission has left the job after just five months because of differences over the way she and the commissioners thought the operation should be run.
The Family Law Section of the New Zealand Law Society has is recommending to the government that section 59 of the Crimes Act 1961, which permits smacking, should be repealed.
Simon Maude, the Family Law Section Chair, says: "The Section believes that careful consideration needs to be given to the development of law that does not sanction the use of violence by parents in the correction of their children... children are entitled to expect the law to protect them. The courts, parents and children need law that is clear and descriptive as to what is permissible and what is not, in order to provide that protection."
Note: What the Law Society ignores is that the law already provides exactly that protection, as demonstrated by New Plymouth District Court Judge Bidois, who last week sentenced a parent who smacked his son so hard, after the boy soiled his pants, that he was described as being "extensively" bruised. The judge showed that the law can clearly distinguish between appropriate discipline and violence.)
The first gay couple to be married in France lost an appeals court battle on Tuesday to have their union legally recognized but vowed to keep on fighting.
Korea is the latest Asian country to look at incentives to encourage couples to have more children.
The chief executive of the Families Commission has left the job after just five months because of differences over the way she and the commissioners thought the operation should be run.
The Family Law Section of the New Zealand Law Society has is recommending to the government that section 59 of the Crimes Act 1961, which permits smacking, should be repealed.
Simon Maude, the Family Law Section Chair, says: "The Section believes that careful consideration needs to be given to the development of law that does not sanction the use of violence by parents in the correction of their children... children are entitled to expect the law to protect them. The courts, parents and children need law that is clear and descriptive as to what is permissible and what is not, in order to provide that protection."
Note: What the Law Society ignores is that the law already provides exactly that protection, as demonstrated by New Plymouth District Court Judge Bidois, who last week sentenced a parent who smacked his son so hard, after the boy soiled his pants, that he was described as being "extensively" bruised. The judge showed that the law can clearly distinguish between appropriate discipline and violence.)
The first gay couple to be married in France lost an appeals court battle on Tuesday to have their union legally recognized but vowed to keep on fighting.
Korea is the latest Asian country to look at incentives to encourage couples to have more children.
Corporate reformers, pumping millions of dollars into charter schools and voucher systems, are ignoring the real revolution in education - homeschooling - says the Reason weblog.
Estimates of the number of children being home-schooled in the USA range up to 2-million.
The great issue for Pope Benedict XVI is the one that he set out in his remarkable sermon at the preconclave Mass in St Peter’s, writes Daniel Johnson in The Times. Does he wish to lead the Church down the primrose path of secularism, following the Christian heartlands of Europe in their descent into moral relativism, or does he intend to turn towards the new missionary Church of Latin America, Africa and Asia, to reaffirm the faith of Christ, the faith of St Peter, the faith of John Paul II? What the fight against communism was for John Paul II, the fight against rampant secularism will be for Benedict XVI.
Tail-out: The latest entrant into the expanded Super-14 Rugby competition is doomed to bottom of the heap, if the psycho-babble surrounding the release of its name and logo is anything to go by. The other teams will fall about laughing over the likes of this:
"The name [Western Force] best represents a strong, energetic and inclusive rugby team that has a solid connection to the state's ideals", went the PR blurb. "It represents the natural elements that have shaped the state of Western Australia - the waves, the heat and the wind, and the minerals and resources that have underpinned its economic strength." The logo features a black swan in "a dynamic circular shape, representing the unity and inclusiveness that the team will bring to the WA community". The colours are "a mid-blue that represents Western Australia's beautiful coastline and clear blue skies, while a sandy gold represents [its] stunning beaches, mineral wealth and the ever-present sunshine". As an unnamed correspondent remarks drily, try thinking about that when you're at the bottom of a ruck.
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
My, how things go full circle. Strong work-based superannuation schemes will underpin a savings strategy to be announced in next month's budget, Finance Minister Michael Cullen says. If I cup my hands to my ear, do I hear the screams of similar schemes killed off by government policies not that many years ago?
The Prostitution Law Review Committee's benchmark report on the state of the sex industry in New Zealand, tabled in Parliament yesterday, estimated there were 5932 sex workers operating in New Zealand in April last year – up nearly 40 per cent from the 4272 identified in a 2001 police survey. Canterbury was identified after Auckland as the second-largest district of sex workers, with 211 massage parlour workers, 50 employed by escort agencies, 75 on the street, 50 working illegally and 132 privately. The report said Canterbury had 25 sex businesses, compared to Wellington's 15 and Auckland's 243.
The report's authors also said it was possible the number working in the sex industry was much greater. The report identified about 200 sex workers under the age of 18, more than half of whom were street workers but 24 per cent of whom were illegally employed by escort agencies.
And Tim Barnett's response? After creating the mess in the first place, he says: "I think the challenge in the law for police is to come up with new models of policing." Unfortunately, the Act also pulled just about all the police's teeth to do that.
There are actually two reports. One on the extent of the "industry", and one a literature review on prostitution in NZ.
Oxford has replaced Cambridge as the UK's best university, according to the Guardian's annual guide.
The United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) this week adopted a resolution against religious defamation. On the surface, the resolution seems like a good one -- expressing "deep concern" at negative stereotyping of religions, intolerance and religious discrimination. But the United States voted against it. The U.S. representative said it did not address the targeting of religions or people of a certain faith (in other words, it would prohibit criticism of Muslim insurgency).
The Terri Schiavo debate was framed almost entirely in the language of individual rights — and not only the inalienable right to life versus the "right to die." Lawyers on both sides piled up human rights arguments. As Ted Olson comments, it was like a giant Oreo stacking contest: Pile up as many rights as you can, and the one with the highest pile wins. Rights language counters rights language, with no other issues allowed to play.
More bad news for Canada's minority Liberal government. 33 Liberal MPs joined the opposition to vote down the government bill to recognise same-sex marriage.
The sexless marriage is one of several reasons why experts fear Japan is on the verge of a demographic disaster. In 2003 Japan's birthrate hit a record low of 1.29, one of the lowest rates in the world. The population will peak next year at about 128 million, then decline. Meanwhile, 200 women a year seek help at a just one clinic in the Tokyo suburbs because have not had sex with their husbands in up to 20 years, and some never.
Multiple marriage (polygamy) isn’t such a distant step away from gay marriage as many pretend, writes Megan Basham. Among the cases she details, on February 3, 2005, former Hildale police officer Rodney Holm argued to have his 2003 conviction for bigamy and sex with a minor overturned partly on the basis that it violated his privacy rights. Holm's attorney Rodney Parker argued that in light of the Supreme Court's decision striking down sodomy laws, the Utah court should find that 32-year-old Holms had a constitutional right to take his 16-year-old sister-in-law as his third "spiritual wife." To that effect, Parker's brief stated, "Current demographics, domestic relations law, and religious diversity all accommodate plural marriage. Popular departure from traditional marriage has made our domestic laws on cohabitation and fornication anachronistic." A decision in this case is expected shortly.
More on the developing i-pod culture. People are using what's on your i-pod to assess what you're like as a person. "Experts say these playlists and digital music libraries may even become a new way for people to size up potential mates or political candidates. 'We do find that people are able to make fairly accurate assessments solely on the basis of a person's top 10 songs,'' said Jason Rentfrow, a psychology consultant who co-authored a 2003 University of Texas study of more than 3,500 people that showed musical taste can provide a road map to a person's personality." Perhaps before long, job applicants will have to hand over their i-pods when they go for an interview.
The following won't mean anything to those not immersed in computers. To those concerned with printing and publishing in any form, it's huge. Adobe is to buy Macromedia for $4.75 billion. It may well mean the death of Freehand and Director. (Once Adobe got hold of it, look what happened to PageMaker, the program that led the world into the desktop publishing era.)
Tail-out: Yet another to add to the list of up-to-now unsuspected contact sports. A double murderer in Rangipo prison has suffered a broken ankle in a bingo row.
The Prostitution Law Review Committee's benchmark report on the state of the sex industry in New Zealand, tabled in Parliament yesterday, estimated there were 5932 sex workers operating in New Zealand in April last year – up nearly 40 per cent from the 4272 identified in a 2001 police survey. Canterbury was identified after Auckland as the second-largest district of sex workers, with 211 massage parlour workers, 50 employed by escort agencies, 75 on the street, 50 working illegally and 132 privately. The report said Canterbury had 25 sex businesses, compared to Wellington's 15 and Auckland's 243.
The report's authors also said it was possible the number working in the sex industry was much greater. The report identified about 200 sex workers under the age of 18, more than half of whom were street workers but 24 per cent of whom were illegally employed by escort agencies.
And Tim Barnett's response? After creating the mess in the first place, he says: "I think the challenge in the law for police is to come up with new models of policing." Unfortunately, the Act also pulled just about all the police's teeth to do that.
There are actually two reports. One on the extent of the "industry", and one a literature review on prostitution in NZ.
Oxford has replaced Cambridge as the UK's best university, according to the Guardian's annual guide.
The United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) this week adopted a resolution against religious defamation. On the surface, the resolution seems like a good one -- expressing "deep concern" at negative stereotyping of religions, intolerance and religious discrimination. But the United States voted against it. The U.S. representative said it did not address the targeting of religions or people of a certain faith (in other words, it would prohibit criticism of Muslim insurgency).
The Terri Schiavo debate was framed almost entirely in the language of individual rights — and not only the inalienable right to life versus the "right to die." Lawyers on both sides piled up human rights arguments. As Ted Olson comments, it was like a giant Oreo stacking contest: Pile up as many rights as you can, and the one with the highest pile wins. Rights language counters rights language, with no other issues allowed to play.
More bad news for Canada's minority Liberal government. 33 Liberal MPs joined the opposition to vote down the government bill to recognise same-sex marriage.
The sexless marriage is one of several reasons why experts fear Japan is on the verge of a demographic disaster. In 2003 Japan's birthrate hit a record low of 1.29, one of the lowest rates in the world. The population will peak next year at about 128 million, then decline. Meanwhile, 200 women a year seek help at a just one clinic in the Tokyo suburbs because have not had sex with their husbands in up to 20 years, and some never.
Multiple marriage (polygamy) isn’t such a distant step away from gay marriage as many pretend, writes Megan Basham. Among the cases she details, on February 3, 2005, former Hildale police officer Rodney Holm argued to have his 2003 conviction for bigamy and sex with a minor overturned partly on the basis that it violated his privacy rights. Holm's attorney Rodney Parker argued that in light of the Supreme Court's decision striking down sodomy laws, the Utah court should find that 32-year-old Holms had a constitutional right to take his 16-year-old sister-in-law as his third "spiritual wife." To that effect, Parker's brief stated, "Current demographics, domestic relations law, and religious diversity all accommodate plural marriage. Popular departure from traditional marriage has made our domestic laws on cohabitation and fornication anachronistic." A decision in this case is expected shortly.
More on the developing i-pod culture. People are using what's on your i-pod to assess what you're like as a person. "Experts say these playlists and digital music libraries may even become a new way for people to size up potential mates or political candidates. 'We do find that people are able to make fairly accurate assessments solely on the basis of a person's top 10 songs,'' said Jason Rentfrow, a psychology consultant who co-authored a 2003 University of Texas study of more than 3,500 people that showed musical taste can provide a road map to a person's personality." Perhaps before long, job applicants will have to hand over their i-pods when they go for an interview.
The following won't mean anything to those not immersed in computers. To those concerned with printing and publishing in any form, it's huge. Adobe is to buy Macromedia for $4.75 billion. It may well mean the death of Freehand and Director. (Once Adobe got hold of it, look what happened to PageMaker, the program that led the world into the desktop publishing era.)
Tail-out: Yet another to add to the list of up-to-now unsuspected contact sports. A double murderer in Rangipo prison has suffered a broken ankle in a bingo row.
Monday, April 18, 2005
Act MP Deborah Coddington has decided to quit politics saying she is no longer angry enough to spend her days attacking people.
Aged care in NZ is in crisis, writes Martin Taylor, chief executive of HealthCare Providers NZ (a providers coalition). Since last November, more than 17 rest homes or complexes have gone on the market, and the Methodist Mission has signalled it may sell its Auckland rest homes. Ten years ago, the average age of people in rest homes was 75 - today it is in the mid-80s, but government funding is up to 20 percent below the sector's requirements. (This article in today's Press has no online link.)However, the Council of Christian Social Services warned the same thing last August. Last week, Don Brash pledged extra support.
Five Scottish universities will today launch a major two-year investigation into why Scotland’s population is shrinking and ageing. The £300,000 scheme will include six separate research projects analysing migration and fertility.
The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty delivered a speech today at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva calling for an end to Sweden's hate speech law. The Becket Fund is a Non-Governmental Organization in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the United Nations. A nonpartisan, interfaith, public interest law firm dedicated to protecting the free expression of all religious traditions, it filed an amicus (friend of the court) brief that helped overturn the judgment against a pastor convicted under the hate speech law.
It is a pity the debate over John Tamihere has obscured the reality of what he told Investigate. Muriel Newman takes up where he left off, and has documented just what's going on behind the scenes in Labour, and where they want to take New Zealand. For instance, she says the Ministry of Social Development Policy and Knowledge Group have undertaken a programme of work – in conjunction with Labour MP Tim Barnett – on issues affecting gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, faáfafine, takatapui, and intersex (GLBT) people. This GLBT policy work programme aims to make progress on overcoming the barriers, which prevent these people from participating in the social and economic life of their communities.
In the document, the Ministry of Social Development claims that the number of GLBT people in the population varies from 3 to 10 percent. That is at odds with Census data that shows that in 2001 only 10,000 people, or 0.3 percent of the adult population categorised themselves as same-sex.
Questions on sexual orientation are in the process of being included in the State Services Commission's Career Progression and Development Survey. It won't be long before the public service is going to be forced to embrace social engineering and political correctness to such an extent that they will be required to report on not only how many women and Maori they employ, but also on how many lesbians, gays and bisexuals. The next step, of course will be employment claims against employers who fail to employ an 'appropriate' quota of homosexuals.
As the OIA reveals, a major objective of the whole Ministry of Social Development work programme is that of "encouraging positive media portrayal of GLBT people and issues" and to "monitor and influence media portrayal of GLBT people and issues".
Proponents of euthanasia have worked with supportive lawmakers in Vermont to introduce a proposed ''Death With Dignity Act.'' The House Human Services Committee held hearings this week on a bill to allow physicians to prescribe lethal doses of medication to terminally ill patients who have less than six months to live.
Hollywood is getting very upset at companies marketing "family friendly" versions of commercial movies, which have removed things like foul language, extreme gore or nudity. Hollywood is suing companies that provide unauthorized edited films. And Congress has waded into the fight with the Family Movie Act, which allows the technology behind the clean-ups.
College freshmen in the USA have some very strong religious values, according to a survey by UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute that analyzed how spirituality figured into the students' attitudes.
In general, the survey indicated that college students are spiritually aware and seeking answers to their spiritual questions. Specifically, researchers found that eight in 10 students attended religious services during the past year and more than two-thirds pray. By a 3-to-1 margin, those with deeper spiritual beliefs were likely to have conservative political views.
Tail-out: Bet you never thought of chess as a contact sport! Garry Kasparov, the world's former No.1 chess player who quit the professional game last month to focus on politics, says he has been hit over the head with a chessboard after signing it for a young man at an event in Moscow. The assailant apparently told the chess champion: "I admired you as a chess player, but you gave that up for politics."
Aged care in NZ is in crisis, writes Martin Taylor, chief executive of HealthCare Providers NZ (a providers coalition). Since last November, more than 17 rest homes or complexes have gone on the market, and the Methodist Mission has signalled it may sell its Auckland rest homes. Ten years ago, the average age of people in rest homes was 75 - today it is in the mid-80s, but government funding is up to 20 percent below the sector's requirements. (This article in today's Press has no online link.)However, the Council of Christian Social Services warned the same thing last August. Last week, Don Brash pledged extra support.
Five Scottish universities will today launch a major two-year investigation into why Scotland’s population is shrinking and ageing. The £300,000 scheme will include six separate research projects analysing migration and fertility.
The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty delivered a speech today at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva calling for an end to Sweden's hate speech law. The Becket Fund is a Non-Governmental Organization in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the United Nations. A nonpartisan, interfaith, public interest law firm dedicated to protecting the free expression of all religious traditions, it filed an amicus (friend of the court) brief that helped overturn the judgment against a pastor convicted under the hate speech law.
It is a pity the debate over John Tamihere has obscured the reality of what he told Investigate. Muriel Newman takes up where he left off, and has documented just what's going on behind the scenes in Labour, and where they want to take New Zealand. For instance, she says the Ministry of Social Development Policy and Knowledge Group have undertaken a programme of work – in conjunction with Labour MP Tim Barnett – on issues affecting gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, faáfafine, takatapui, and intersex (GLBT) people. This GLBT policy work programme aims to make progress on overcoming the barriers, which prevent these people from participating in the social and economic life of their communities.
In the document, the Ministry of Social Development claims that the number of GLBT people in the population varies from 3 to 10 percent. That is at odds with Census data that shows that in 2001 only 10,000 people, or 0.3 percent of the adult population categorised themselves as same-sex.
Questions on sexual orientation are in the process of being included in the State Services Commission's Career Progression and Development Survey. It won't be long before the public service is going to be forced to embrace social engineering and political correctness to such an extent that they will be required to report on not only how many women and Maori they employ, but also on how many lesbians, gays and bisexuals. The next step, of course will be employment claims against employers who fail to employ an 'appropriate' quota of homosexuals.
As the OIA reveals, a major objective of the whole Ministry of Social Development work programme is that of "encouraging positive media portrayal of GLBT people and issues" and to "monitor and influence media portrayal of GLBT people and issues".
Proponents of euthanasia have worked with supportive lawmakers in Vermont to introduce a proposed ''Death With Dignity Act.'' The House Human Services Committee held hearings this week on a bill to allow physicians to prescribe lethal doses of medication to terminally ill patients who have less than six months to live.
Hollywood is getting very upset at companies marketing "family friendly" versions of commercial movies, which have removed things like foul language, extreme gore or nudity. Hollywood is suing companies that provide unauthorized edited films. And Congress has waded into the fight with the Family Movie Act, which allows the technology behind the clean-ups.
College freshmen in the USA have some very strong religious values, according to a survey by UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute that analyzed how spirituality figured into the students' attitudes.
In general, the survey indicated that college students are spiritually aware and seeking answers to their spiritual questions. Specifically, researchers found that eight in 10 students attended religious services during the past year and more than two-thirds pray. By a 3-to-1 margin, those with deeper spiritual beliefs were likely to have conservative political views.
Tail-out: Bet you never thought of chess as a contact sport! Garry Kasparov, the world's former No.1 chess player who quit the professional game last month to focus on politics, says he has been hit over the head with a chessboard after signing it for a young man at an event in Moscow. The assailant apparently told the chess champion: "I admired you as a chess player, but you gave that up for politics."
