The Mike Hosking Breakfast

President Donald Trump is infusing deliberations over his coming nomination of a new Supreme Court justice with political meaning as he aims to maximize the benefit before Nov. 3 and even secure an electoral backstop should the result be contested.
Even before Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death last week, the president had tried to use likelihood of more Supreme Court vacancies to his political advantage. Now, as he closes in on a decision on her likely replacement, Trump has used the vacancy to appeal to battleground-state voters and as a rallying cry for his conservative base.
He also is increasingly embracing the high court — which he will have had an outsized hand in reshaping -– as an insurance policy in a close election.
Increases in mail, absentee and early voting brought about by the pandemic have already brought about a flurry of election litigation, and both Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden have assembled armies of lawyers to continue the fight once vote-counting begins. Trump has been open about tying his push to name a third justice to the court to a potentially drawn-out court fight to determine who will be sworn in on Jan. 20, 2021.
"I think this will end up in the Supreme Court," Trump said Wednesday of the election, adding, "And I think it's very important that we have nine justices."
It's a line echoed by Trump allies, including Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who said Thursday, "I think that threat to challenge the election is one of the real reasons why it is so important that we confirm the Supreme Court nominees, so that there's a full Supreme Court on the bench to resolve any election challenge."
Barely six weeks from Election Day, and as millions of Americans are already voting, Trump and his advisers have tried to use the court vacancy to help deliver Trump another term in office.
Supreme Court nominations are never entirely devoid of political considerations, but Trump's decision has been particularly wrapped up in a charged political moment.
Within hours of Ginsburg's death, Trump made clear his intention to nominate a woman in her stead, after previously putting two men on the court and as he struggles to mitigate an erosion in support among suburban women.
In discussing his five-person short list, he's been sure to highlight some from election battlegrounds that he's aiming to win this fall as much as their jurisprudence.
"I've heard incredible things about her," he said of Florida's Barbara Lagoa, a day after Ginsburg's death. "I don't know her. She's Hispanic and highly respected. Miami. Highly respected."
In an interview with a Detroit television station, he volunteered that hometown Justice Joan Larsen is "very talented."
Trump was even considering a meeting with Lagoa this week in Florida, where he plans campaign events. The appellate court judge was confirmed last year by the Senate in a bipartisan vote and has been promoted for the court by GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis and others as a nominee with more across-the-board appeal.
Trump and his aides, though, appear to have set their sights on nominating Judge Amy Coney Barrett of Indiana, who was at the White House twice this week, including for a Monday meeting with Trump.
The staunch conservative's 2017 confirmation on a party-line vote included allegations that Democrats were attacking her Catholic faith. Trump allies see that as a political windfall for them should Democrats attempt to do so once again. Catholic voters in Pennsylvania, in particular, are viewed as a pivotal demographic in the swing state that Democratic nominee Joe Biden is trying to recapture.
On Wednesday, Vice President Mike Pence defended Barrett when asked whether her affiliation with People of Praise, a charismatic Christian community, would complicate her ability to serve on the high court.
"I must tell you the intolerance expressed during her last confirmation about her Catholic faith I really...

Concerns are being raised around why community pharmacies haven't seen a cent of the Government’s $18 million financial support package.
The Pharmacy Guild of New Zealand is calling for urgent action to support under-pressure pharmacies struggling to cope with the high cost of responding to Covid-19.
Chief Executive Andrew Gaudin says it's unfair many pharmacies are having to cut staff, hours or even shut up shop due to a lack of funding.
"They shouldn't be out of pocket for maintaining essential services for all New Zealanders. It's not right." 
He says pharmacies are out of pocket and are wondering what they have to do to get support.
"The $18 million was intended to help all pharmacies who responded as essential service providers, so we are just simply saying, why don't you just allocate the money out like you did for all essential services providers?"

The cricket world has been left reeling after the shock and sudden death of Australian legend Dean Jones.
Jones was only 59 when he passed away in Mumbai with the news of his death sending shockwaves across the globe.
The Australian cricket legend was in India working in the commentary booth for the IPL when it is believed he suffered a sudden heart attack, according to ESPNCricInfo.
Jones collapsed in a Mumbai hotel where fellow former cricketer Brett Lee was on the scene and performed CPR. He is understand to have collapsed around 7pm (AEST), according to The Australian.
"It is with great sadness that we share the news of the passing away of Mr. Dean Mervyn Jones AM," Star India, who Jones was a commentator for, said via a statement.
"He died of a sudden cardiac arrest. We express our deep condolences to his family and stand ready to support them in this difficult time. We are in touch with the Australian High Commission to make the necessary arrangements.
"Dean Jones was one of the great ambassadors of the game associating himself with Cricket development across South Asia. He was passionate about discovering new talent and nurturing young Cricketers. He was a champion commentator whose presence and presentation of the game always brought joy to millions of fans. He will be sorely missed by everyone at Star and his millions of fans across the globe."
Jones played in 52 Tests for Australia, averaging 46.55 runs throughout a stellar career that resulted in 3631 runs and 11 centuries.

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The push to crack down on hate speech is being driven by religious groups.
Labour's pledging to strengthen laws around religious discrimination, if re-elected next month.
Justice Minister Andrew Little told Mike Hosking after the mosque shootings, some groups have shared their experiences, and how they've been affected.
"Here's what we hear calling out to us on the street, here's what we see written on signs, and some of it is pretty egregious stuff."
He does admit that politicians have to be careful when drafting laws like this, because of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, which protects some rights and freedoms.
"The law is very important, but that's why you put around a paper that says 'here's a way of looking at' before you get to the law draft, because if you don't get agreement on the underlying policy, then there's no point in drafting a law."

President Donald Trump's stunning refusal to commit to a peaceful transition of power was mostly dismissed by Republicans on Capitol Hill, with many downplaying the remarks as merely rhetoric and others deflecting questions about a comment that Democrats fear could threaten a fundamental principle of American democracy.
"The President says crazy stuff. We've always had a peaceful transition of power. It's not going to change," said Republican Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska, who has been an occasional critic of the President.
While Republicans insisted there would be a peaceful transition, many did not go so far as to explicitly criticize his remarks after Trump on Wednesday would not commit to providing a peaceful transition of power after Election Day, lending further fuel to concerns he may not relinquish his office should he lose in November.
House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy on Thursday insisted there will be a peaceful transition, but also suggested he is not concerned by the remarks.
"Let me be very clear to you: It'll be peaceful," McCarthy said, adding, "no questions, no qualms, no concerns, it's going to be peaceful."
Trump's comments amounted to a familiar pattern on Capitol Hill: Stoking a controversy, and putting Republicans in a jam. But this time, he stoked fears about a basic tenet of democracy, forcing Republicans to weigh in and insist the election results will be adhered to -- even if many didn't want take him on by name.
The No. 2 Senate Republican, John Thune of South Dakota, told CNN that he and other Republicans would stand up to Trump if he tried an extra-constitutional power grab.
"Republicans believe in the rule of law, we believe in the Constitution, and that's what dictates what happens (in) ... our election process and so yes," Thune said when asked if he is confident that Republicans would not permit a non-peaceful transfer power to occur.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell rarely weighs in on controversial Trump comments, but did so on Thursday, although he didn't single out the President.
"The winner of the November 3rd election will be inaugurated on January 20th. There will be an orderly transition just as there has been every four years since 1792," McConnell, who is running for reelection this cycle in Kentucky, tweeted Thursday morning.
Mitt Romney of Utah, the lone Senate Republican to break ranks and vote to convict during the President's impeachment trial, however, went the furthest and was sharply critical of the President's message, though he did not refer to him by name in his response.
"Fundamental to democracy is the peaceful transition of power; without that, there is Belarus. Any suggestion that a president might not respect this Constitutional guarantee is both unthinkable and unacceptable," Romney tweeted Wednesday evening, referencing the disputed presidential elections in Belarus.
Sen. John Cornyn, a member of the Senate GOP leadership team, told CNN it was not appropriate for Trump to refuse to commit to a peaceful transition of power. "No," Cornyn said when asked if it was appropriate. Asked if the GOP would do something about it if he won't leave office if he loses, Cornyn said: "I'm not going to answer a hypothetical."
Sen. Susan Collins, who is facing a competitive reelection fight in Maine, said that while she has concerns about the comments, she is "confident that we will see it occur once again."
"I don't know what his thinking was, but we have always had a controlled transition between administrations. And I'm certain that if there's a change in administrations, that we have the calmness as well. It's fundamental to our democracy," she said.
A number of other Republicans, though, did not sound alarmed at the President's remarks, while still arguing that the threat raised by them will not come to fruition.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham, in a difficult reelection race in South...

The opposition is calling on Labour to explain how much its policies will ultimately cost the country.
National's Economic Development spokesman Todd McClay says the total cost of them could be as much as $2.8 billion a year for businesses.
Labour has committed to lifting minimum wage, increasing sick leave requirements and creating another public holiday.
He told Mike Hosking the Government needs to stop piling the cost on business.
"As we head into a recession, we should be looking at ways to reduce cost upon business to help them create the thousands of jobs Kiwis will need, and these policies won't do that. In fact, I think they'll have the opposite effect."
McClay says the Government should be finding ways to help businesses pay their bills, not piling more bills on them.
"What we actually want is a business environment where businesses can create jobs and help grow our way out of this economy.
"These are all cost to businesses, not to the government."

So was the debate a hit? Yes and no: the ratings tell a story.
The numbers were good but not great. 1.1 million tuned in Tuesday night  vs 1.3 million compared to three years ago.
A key here is that’s the total number - 1.1 million, the number of people that watched at least one minute, which if you’re one of the participants is not what you want
So the key here is the average. The average was 657,000,  good on any night of regular  programming  but given the nature of the debate, what we can deduce is that a lot of people didn’t hang around for the whole show .
In other words it wasn’t good telly. It wasn’t sticky, it wasn’t a good watch, and if you need the debates to work for you that’s a problem. I personally would have given up if it hadn’t been work.
But the upside is over a million even tuning in does reassure us that at last at least a chunk of us have woken up enough to take an interest, and it bodes well going forwards.
Given we got a result as such, as meandering as parts of it were, it was generally accepted that Collins won and therefore that peaks the interest as to what Ardern does with a defeat and whether she has a new plan for next week.
Toss in a poll or two, and we actually have a race with a good number of interested voters. This is all good for democracy.
It’s also a reminder that right or wrong, good or bad, there is very little in life left that still truly unites a country.
The media landscape is so fragmented and has been for years now. The water cooler days of communal watches have long since passed.
So it’s a reminder that for all its weaknesses and partisan nonsense, how a country is run and who runs it is one of the few things we are happy to sort of gather together and participate in.
In excess 80 per cent of us will eventually vote. Compare it to America where barely half turn out, and their debates will be watched by comparatively a handful compared to ours.
So not a record number, but close enough, and thank god proof at last that we as a country we have worked out this actually counts.

The Reserve Bank has kept its official cash rate (OCR) unchanged at 0.25 per cent and has left its bond buying cap at $100 billion, but said it would look at offering cheaper funding for the banks towards the end of the year.
The central bank , in its latest monetary policy report, largely kept to the script expected of it from the market, aside from its comment that it aimed to have funding for lending (FLP) for the banks in place by the end of this year.
On March 16, amid the depths of concern about the worldwide spread of Covid-19, the central bank cut its OCR by 75 basis points to the current level and said it would remain at that level "for at least the next 12 months".
The messaging from the bank as to the OCR's future path has remained the same since March, but current market pricing suggests it may move earlier.
Chief Economist at ANZ Bank Sharon Zollner joined Mike Hosking to explain what this all means.
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The British government has defended its strategy for combating a second wave of COVID-19 cases amid criticism that its new slate of restrictions will not be enough to stop coronavirus from spreading exponentially.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson unveiled the new rules — including a 10 p.m. curfew on bars and restaurants, increased use of face masks and once again encouraging people to work from home — in a televised address .
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab told the BBC that the government's approach was proportionate and enough to slow the spread of the virus as long as everyone complies with the rules.
"I think that it's a balanced approach, it's a targeted approach and, actually, one that can make sure that we preserve the health gains that we've made, prevent the virus expanding exponentially, but also keep businesses, livelihoods and society open,'' Raab said.
Yet many health experts said they did not think the government's plan would be sufficient to stop the country's rapid rise in new COVID-19 infections. The government's top medical advisers warned this week that new cases were doubling every seven days. They said that could lead to nearly 50,000 new cases a day by mid-October and 200 deaths a day by early November if nothing was done to slow transmission of the virus.
John Edmunds, the dean of epidemiology and population health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the measures announced Tuesday are very limited and won't be enough to get the virus back under control. He compared it to the nationwide lockdown imposed in March that closed most businesses and forced most people to stay home.
"We will have let the epidemic double and double and double again" until we take those broader measures, Edmunds told the BBC. "And then we'll have the worst of both worlds, because then to slow the epidemic and bring it back down again … will mean putting the breaks on the epidemic for a very long time, very hard."
The other nations in the U.K. — Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland — also tightened restrictions Tuesday, going further than England in some cases.
The new restrictions touched off further worry about the fate of Britain's economy, as previous furlough measures meant to protect jobs are due to expire. The prime minister told the House of Commons on Wednesday that the government will introduce "further creative and imaginative schemes to keep our economy moving."
Treasury chief Rishi Sunak plans to update lawmakers Thursday on plans "to continue protecting jobs through the winter."
Case numbers continued to climb. The U.K. government said Wednesday it had recorded 6,178 new confirmed coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, one of the highest daily totals since the pandemic began.
"We are testing much more than we were earlier on in the outbreak and our local health protection teams are working with local councils and directors of public health to manage the increase," said Yvonne Doyle, medical director at Public Health England.
Many scientists fear another round of the outbreak's earlier path, when the virus spread swiftly through the country, hitting nursing homes hard. The U.K. has reported 41,825 people dying within 28 days of testing positive, Europe's highest death toll, but experts say all such numbers undercount the true impact of the pandemic due to limited testing and missed cases.
"I think we haven't learned from our mistake back then and we're, unfortunately, about to repeat it," Edmunds said.