📢 ASB comes back again for more mortgage rate rises. Kiwibank also raises rates. They also adjusted TD rates up, but only to rivals' levels

In today’s HeraldOnSunday

PM Christopher Luxon, and his self-inflicted affliction, the architect of the Treaty Principles Bill, David Seymour. My #cartoon today #NZpol #Waitangi #ToitūTeTiriti

The staffer

The presumed upcoming El Nino will help cement and quantify global warming acceleration, showing that 2C global warming is likely to be reached in the 2030s, not at midcentury. See Another El Nino Already? mailchi.mp/caa/another-... Also available on Substack: jimehansen.substack.com/p/another-el...

Treasury's advice and forecasts are clearly not working.

It beggars belief that the Reserve Bank is on the verge of tightening policy again and the Government is keeping policy tight. 'We now have nearly 1 in 7 adults on a working age benefit.' Full employment? Yeah...nah.

The tragedy of our horizons.

When NZ First loses recreational fishers, something has gone wrong...for NZ First

National. Prayer. Breakfast

Jeff Bezos Changes Washington Post’s Slogan To ‘Love You, Babe’ After Getting Into Fight With Lauren Sánchez https://theonion.com/jeff-bezos-changes-washington-posts-slogan-to-love-you-babe-after-getting-into-fight-with-lauren-sanchez/

In today’s NZ Herald

Trump at National Prayer Breakfast: "They rigged the second election. I had to win it. I needed it for my own ego. I would've had a bad ego for the rest of my life. Now I really have a big ego. Beating these lunatics was incredible ... The first time they said I didn't win the popular vote. I did"

By @deadder.bsky.social . Breathtaking.

Reports lay bare criticisms of Veolia’s management of Wellington’s wastewater plants, but it was retained because of the high costs and risks in terminating the $170m contract.

If Jeff Bezos could afford to spend $75 million on the Melania movie & $500 million for a yacht to sail off to his $55 million wedding to give his wife a $5 million ring, please don't tell me he needed to fire one-third of the Washington Post staff. Democracy dies in oligarchy.

They've reworked the plumbing...

Smile for the economy. My cartoon in today's @theageaustralia.bsky.social

Another generation is being crucified by our discredited monetary and fiscal policies. Again.

Chorus out: The Government is hoping voters will 'feel' economic recovery by Nov 7 as 'green shoots' appear (again), but election year has begun with falling house prices, unemployment rising to a 10-year high and real wages deflating. #nzpol thekaka.substack.com/p/election-y...

FYI I’ve opened this one up for full public reading, listening & sharing after requests from paying subscribers. Their support allows me to do this public interest journalism on Aotearoa’s political economy around housing, climate & poverty in public. #nzpol thekaka.substack.com/p/liquidatio...

Not much ever changes in our housing-market-with-bits-tacked-on political economy.

Their's, baby, their's.

In today’s NZ Herald

Trump: “The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over,’” he said. “We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many — 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.”

📢 ANZ doesn't hold back with its latest fixed mortgage rate increases, raising all two years and longer. But they did also raise TD rates at the same time, even if it was for terms savers avoid

The Government is talking a lot about an economic recovery and lower inflation. But it doesn’t feel like it for a bunch of businesses and households. Will it by November 7? #nzpol Liquidations surge to near post-GFC highs open.substack.com/pub/thekaka/...

ICYMI: Great scoop from @wsj.com As I’ve said before, the level of self-dealing by the Trump family—this example undisclosed—is off the charts. Where is Congress? (Obvious answer, I know.) www.wsj.com/politics/pol...

[Bloomberg-Gift article]: ICE Begins Buying ‘Mega’ Warehouse Detention Centers Across US By Sophie Alexander and Fola Akinnibi, January 29, 2026 www.bloomberg.com/news/feature...

US boots on the ground in Iran? Hoo boy.

I don't really want to criticise too much, because I admire their work but I reported in Minneapolis everywhere with a press badge with my name on it and I am a foreigner on a visa, while activists were being more careful than I was in Burundi when I was the only foreign journalist in the country

Breaking: the Government is negotiating with the US to provide access to our critical minerals, while a memo before the Waitangi Tribunal says a backdoor deal violates obligations to Māori

outfit has the same colors as the crying emoji 😭

A grand coalition??? In today’s NZ Herald

Taking flight www.politico.com/cartoons/202...

Five federal polls have been released in the past week, painting a rosy picture for Pauline Hanson’s party.

Exclusive: The Trump administration has held covert meetings with fringe separatists from the oil-rich Canadian province as a rift deepens between Washington and Ottawa. ft.trib.al/zYlleOJ

Yikes. Fort Sumter.

there’s up to two years until the next Australian election so lots can change but not good that One Nation (far right party) is now polling ahead of Liberal-National (right wing) at this point

Adding fuel to the fires. My cartoon in today's @theageaustralia.bsky.social

And New Zealand is still thinking about joining this…

Zing!

In today’s NZ Herald

Activists said Tuesday that at least 6,126 people were killed in Iran’s crackdown on nationwide protests and many more are still feared dead.

Cartoon by Adam Zyglis

BREAKING Greg Bovino has been removed as Border Patrol "commander at large" and will return to El Centro Calif, where he is expected to retire soon. A stunning turnaround after Pretti killing. Bovino's traveling blue city crackdown is over www.theatlantic.com/politics/202...

This is where we are now. Germany is being urged to bring home its gold stored in US before Trump takes it. Emanuel Mönch, the former head of research at the Bundesbank: “Given the current geopolitical situation, it seems risky to store so much gold in the US.” www.yahoo.com/news/article...

Looks like Xi purged his top general because he wasn't getting the PLA ready fast enough to invade Taiwan next year. Gulp.

Yep, it was all about how bad they looked on TV for our cable news addicted president. "According to one official, Trump spent several hours on Sunday and Monday watching the coverage and was personally unhappy by how his administration was coming across." www.cnn.com/us/live-news...