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Rural News columnist and satirist The Hound has drawn flak from the notorious blogger Cameron Slater, better known as Whaleoil, and his faithful followers after writing an opinion piece questioning the blogger's trenchant attacks on the Ruataniwha dam proposal.
Slater has blogged many times criticising the Hawkes Bay dam. In Rural News this week, The Hound said it had been suggested by "confidantes" that Slater has close ties to political operative Simon Lusk, an outspoken critic of the dam.
The blogger seemed more upset about The Hound's opinion of his blog, that it was a "refuge for nutjobs and losers", than the claim about his ties with Lusk. He posted the Hound piece on his website and invited his readers to contact Rural News directly to vent their spleen, leading to a dozen or so emails from his supporters, some of them threatening in nature.
Most of the comments posted by readers under the Whaleoil post about the Hound were in a similar vein. Only a couple of them addressed the core issue, the Ruataniwha dam.
'Axeman' wrote, "Putting aside politics and funding, I like the idea of a dam, it just makes sense to store water if you are able, to use at a later date. I can tell you that...the [Tukituki River] flow is very low and I would suggest the health of the river is not sharp and so is toxic anyway. To my way of thinking we owe it to future generations to ensure that water is available and our rivers run fresh."
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