Tuesday's pick o' the links: Wayne Brown's WTF moment

Brown moans to 'Grumpy Old Men' tennis mates about having to cancel tennis game to deal with media on Friday's flood day; EU rolls up its sleeves to fight its corner in green subsidies weapons race

Wayne Brown managed a smile when meeting with Remuera residents, but he was grumpy about having to deal with “media drongos”. Photo: Lynn Grieveson/Getty Images

TLDR: In my pick of the news links found in my rounds since 4am for paying subscribers below the paywall:

• Wayne Brown moans about the media and the rain on Friday to his tennis mates;

• China gets set to unleash a flood of students to Aotearoa and elsewhere;

• Ford cuts its electric car prices ub response to Tesla’s price cuts;

• The EU joins a green subsidies arms race with the US; and,

• All about the left-wing economist behind Jim Chalmers’ post-capitalism manifesto.

In Aotearoa’s political economy

You couldn’t make this up - David Fisher has the scoop this morning in the NZ Herald about Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown’s WhatsApp comments to his ‘Grumpy Old Men’ tennis mates about having to cancel their game on Friday because of having to deal with media ‘drongos’ requests about the flood. This will embolden more people to call for his resignation. And when Wayne loses the Herald he is in trouble…the detail about Brown begging Fish not to run it is instructive.

Here’s the detail: