>> While the manifesto – a meme-laden soup of troll-tastic nihilistic nonsense – has been outlawed in New Zealand

I haven't read this particular manifesto, and won't. But I do disagree with writings being outlawed.

That probably seems like an odd position to take, but the extreme counter-example is there was a year when the US Declaration of Independence was a violence-inciting manifesto.

I'm not saying this guy's manifesto is like the Declaration of Independence of course. What I'm saying is, if I live in a society that has to outlaw BOTH or NEITHER, I choose neither.

The censors are ultimately scrubbing history clean. If we can't know the history, how are we supposed to learn from it?

How can a Visual Basic macro executed as a regular user write to the MBR? Maybe it's asking for elevation?

I believe the VB was used to download a binary which accomplished the overwrite.

...which would still need to be elevated.