Some better personal news. Was hoping to make score of 36 but 20k a day on the bike is adding up.

Cheers everyone. Had a bit of an adventure this morning. But it is my birthday so here for cannoli & Bellini.

Paul Goldsmith tells me today he has decided not to appeal this decision. "I didn't see the point of dragging it out for more months and more expense."

End of an era. Backlisted is the good stuff. Well done, all.

False modesty is bullshit. So this is an exceptional episode of the podcast I have poured my heart, soul and brain into for ten years. It was a privilege to discuss C.S. Lewis with Rowan Williams, knowing a) you'd get to hear it and b) nobody does it like we do. www.backlisted.fm/episodes/257...

It's my birthday tomorrow - still listening to everything I can and soaking it in sponge like same as when I was 5. If I was making a playlist this would be on it. gaudimusic.bandcamp.com/album/ennio-...

Tomorrow we release the final episode of Backlisted for the foreseeable future.* After ten years, it's a very odd feeling. I am looking forward to spending more time with my books and fewer times on social media. * Boats against the current, we beat on via Patreon. www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmQK...

Let’s have a little bit of a chat about an economic concept known as the learning rate, and why it makes an LNG terminal a batshit insane idea 🧵 #nzpol

It's the most flawless economic plan since they paid $671 million to buy zero ferries.

These would be the same downward pressures that reduced rents across the country when National handed billions to landlords. Also: thanks for your amazing mahi, Marc

*Call for Grace Tame to be awarded more, and higher, Australian honours.* Grace is a true humanitarian. She is fighting to protect one of the most vulnerable at risk communities on the planet. Right wing forces hate her because she is right and good. @abcnewsbot.bsky.social

The lecture “The crisis of human collective decision-making in a social media world” by Prof. Carl Bergstrom, (University of Washington) @ Otago Uni was very interesting. Dis/misinformation in the current world of AI slop and the effect it also in democratic processses is significant.

The vibe today in Wellington.

Here is a smoking gun ….

💯👇

Look at me, pontificating in my lane: www.nzherald.co.nz/business/cor...

honestly i feel like anyone could sell us a monorail at this point. how stupid are we?? #nzpol

I know we've all got submission fatigue but the Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill are incredibly dangerous for conservation. Submissions close this Friday at 4.30 pm. #NZPol www3.parliament.nz/en/pb/sc/mak...

This pic has come up every third post or so in my timeline 3-4 times now and I'm loving it. Can we make it a feature of BlueSky? This is your cleansing shouty pīwakawaka meep break.

Watched / listened to the new Aldous Harding / Sleaford Mods song. I like both of them separately & not sure it works at all.

FYI I’ve opened this up for full public reading, listening & sharing after requests from paying subscribers. Their support allows me to do this kind of public interest journalism on Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate & poverty in public. #nzpol thekaka.substack.com/p/why-not-sp...

I've seen Brown interviewed before, but I think this was the most interesting one. Her reporting is the reason there is such a thing as the Epstein Files: SDNY began investigating after reading her reporting in 2018. youtu.be/7awbgL_BP_k?...

We could reduce industrial gas use by 10-20 PJ a year for a one-off cost of $200 million. Spend more on bringing forward planned wind, solar and battery projects and we can almost wipe out the 30PJ used for electricity. Force the exit of Methanex and Kapuni, and problem largely solved.

About 45% of gas produced in this country goes to Methanex, the Canadian multinational. Fonterra is another significant gas user. Just in case you are wondering who stands to benefit most from the planned LNG plant which is to be paid for by me, thee and every other individual user of power.

"This is Just Who Trump Is" by @jamellebouie.net www.nytimes.com/2026/02/07/o...

Bit late to it but if you want to know the chain of events that led to us importing gas (and charging electricity users to pay for it!!), I did this deep dive for RNZ last year www.rnz.co.nz/news/nationa...

One thing I picked up on from talking to overseas infrastructure folk at the summit was the National Party's obsession with roading to the exclusion of other projects puts off international investors. One said they can't get anyone in government to listen to anything else... no matter how good.

Here’s the thing. Power bills in this country suck. The price keeps going up. It’s a financial burden on many households. Campaigning on actual measures that would lower those bills - forgetting entirely the benefits to the country - would win votes. An LPG terminal isn’t going to win votes.

‘A free limo is hard to turn away’: how car diplomacy turbo charges politics in the Pacific

But our idiot egghead PM is hellbent on taking us down the other path. WTF? WhyTF? Do we not have sun & wind in Aotearoa NZ? #nzpol

Any Ethel Cain fans on here? I'm going to the concert. American Teenager has plenty of earworms but which songs do you really like? Crush? or some other song. youtu.be/9Ed_WWmFy9I?...

This is such bs from the government. While the rest of the world gets on with solar, wind and other forms of renewable distributed generation, we go further and further backwards. I hate it. We're the dumping ground for the world's sunset industries.

"we’re building a one billion dollar fossil fuel terminal so we can keep not having free power"

Why the LNG terminal is being built> "An important component of this is how pricing in the wholesale electricity market works. Generators bid into the market and then everyone gets paid the clearing price – whatever the most expensive bid is that’s still needed to meet demand. Usually, that’s gas."

Or to put it another way, $22/GJ subsidy is the equivalent of a $407/tonne carbon price subsidy. How are clean alternatives like biomass, pumped hydro or demand response supposed to compete with the playing-field tilted against them to the tune of $407/tonne? 2/-

COMPULSORY READING 👇

This is a really big, terrifying deal 🧪

No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition. Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

It's just If Indiana's 76 operational data centers are already eating up HALF of the power in the whole state the what the fuck is gonna happen when there's 152 of them online and this mythical new Gen genAI nuclear scam is still a decade away

Oh, so just caught up with the news - new taxes can just disappear by calling them levies. Sweet. That wealth levy of ours should now be supported by everyone. Labour can go bolder with its CGL

Some governments raise taxes to fund public health and education. Not Luxon. He is literally raising taxes to subsidise fossil fuels. He is putting a levy on our electricity bills to pay for his LNG import terminal.

Current status: A MountainGoats album. Hard to keep up but that is a good problem to have. As a writer John Darnielle knows precisely what to leave out and that is what makes his music such a treat. And they are here too [email protected] themountaingoats.bandcamp.com/album/throug...

Oh the mountainous inhumanity 🥲

“Even in New Zealand, we have start ups such as TasmanIon which is developing aluminium-based batteries to reduce our reliance on lithium. Or Zincovery and Mint Innovation are fantastic examples of companies taking technological and industrial waste..." by @nicgaston.bsky.social

"We, as Western nations, must choose between becoming closed and impoverished societies or open and prosperous ones. Growth or retreat: Those are the two options before us. And by growth, I’m not talking only about material gain, but also our spiritual development." Pedro Sánchez, Spanish PM

#nzpol We need to adopt the dispassionate clarity and truth that Kermode has mastered. This is exceptional youtu.be/DTyUni8dbkE?...

Jeff Bezos’s wealth has increased an average of $70 million every day of 2026, meaning that he could have offset The Post’s losses with what he’s made since Monday.

10:15pm & the last of the days light is fading fast in the SW sky. Overlooking Otago Harbour from Muaūpoko Otago Peninsula to Ōtepoti Dunedin city. NZ. Glorious evening.

William Nordhaus received the Nobel Memorial Prize for these flawed economic models, and Bjorn Lomborg built a highly lucrative career on them. They told rich and powerful people what they wanted to hear. While helping to consign us all to catastrophe. www.theguardian.com/environment/...