us politics

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Kamala Harris (2)

Polity: Taxing multinationals via sales

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 11:35 am, July 22nd, 2014 - 30 comments

An interesting idea out of the US for how to fairly tax multinationals around the world. Declare a worldwide profit, find out where they made their sales, an apportion the profit to various jurisdictions.

I protest against Gaza offensive

Written By: karol - Date published: 8:51 am, July 18th, 2014 - 200 comments

This is just too awful to let go without saying something. Update: Protest tomorrow (Sat 19 July) Aotea Square, Auckland, 2pm.

Polity: Japan opposes, sinks NZ-style TPP

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 10:28 am, July 8th, 2014 - 6 comments

New Zealand has almost no leverage in 21st century trade talks because we have gave it away in the 80s and 90s. The 12 country TPP is better thought of now as a bilateral US/Japan deal with as many hangers on as would like to hang on. The trapping are still of a 12 country deal, of course. The TPP club is Barack, Shinzo, and nobody else. That’s realpolitik.

Polity: TPP deal on rocks. Surprise!

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 11:41 am, June 24th, 2014 - 10 comments

John Key is abandoning hope of a TPP deal. As it stands at present there is nothing in it for New Zealand. Of course the usual ugly swamp that is US internal politics is making the deal descend into a mire.

Expect nothing to happen for another year or two, and maybe the damn thing will never happen.

John Key: a tale of two ‘truths’

Written By: karol - Date published: 9:08 am, June 23rd, 2014 - 34 comments

John Key claimed he didn’t know about the big shift in the US-NZ surveillance relationship in 2009. Now he claims he always likes to be fully briefed on intelligence matters. Robert David Steele points the way from such anti-democratic governance & misinformation, to an open source everything revolution.

Key-Fletcher nexus: anti-democratic ‘Intelligence communities’

Written By: karol - Date published: 11:36 am, May 23rd, 2014 - 47 comments

Campbell Live pointed to a massive, integrated shift in NZ governance under John Key’s watch. This enhances the power of international trade and commerce, incorporating the GCSB the US, & 5 Eyes . At the centre of this shift, is the murky relationship between John Key & Ian Fletcher.

“Collect it all”, “exploit it all”: 5 Eyes economic surveillance

Written By: karol - Date published: 9:10 pm, May 15th, 2014 - 54 comments

Glenn Greenwald, interviewed on Democracy Now, outlines the extent of the NSA-led 5 Eyes surveillance systems. It is a leap from sci fi into our daily lives. Economic surveillance dominates. John Key & Ian Fletcher have some questions to answer – have they misled us? [Update: documents link]

The drone strike killing of a Kiwi

Written By: redfed - Date published: 8:41 am, April 21st, 2014 - 282 comments

The Government is completely indifferent to the killing of innocent children and New Zealand citizens because it is part of the war against terrorism. But the extra judicial killing of innocent adults and children is by definition a terrorist act.

From slum-house to mega-man: Mana-TIP connections

Written By: karol - Date published: 1:17 pm, April 12th, 2014 - 405 comments

There’s a lot of media attention on the negotiations between Mana & The Internet Party (TIP). Mana aims to link with some other parties. Some high profile people are scheduled to speak to Mana. Is Dotcom’s focus on his poor childhood genuine or a PR strategy? [Update#2: Sunday, NZ Herald – green light for negotiations]

NRT: Blowback

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 6:56 pm, March 31st, 2014 - 6 comments

“The vast scale of online surveillance revealed by Edward Snowden is changing how businesses store commercially sensitive data…” “A survey of 1,000 business leaders from around the world has found that many are questioning their reliance on “cloud computing” in favour of more secure forms of data storage as the whistleblower’s revelations continue to reverberate.”

Corporates for TPP

Written By: karol - Date published: 9:00 am, March 22nd, 2014 - 47 comments

Big (US) Pharma has been the leading lobbyist that has shaped the TPP, followed by corporates in the following industries; Hollywood, automobile, textiles, dairy. This makes the TPP a major threat to the interests and well-being of Kiwis. Good reasons to take part in next Saturday’s Day Of Action (29 March 1pm) across NZ.

NRT: A global cyberwar against everyone

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 11:31 am, March 14th, 2014 - 14 comments

The latest NSALeak: the NSA is deliberately spreading malware on a massive scale to spy on everyone. This isn’t the sort of targeted operation they aimed at Belgacom – its effectively a global cyberwar against everyone. They infected 100,000 computers already, and they plan to infect millions – well beyond any possible number needed strictly for “national security”. Why? So they can pwn you

Polity: Endangered! Polls without cell phones

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 5:07 pm, March 13th, 2014 - 28 comments

Here’s a pretty astounding graphic from the US about cellphone vs landline use. The US is a few years ahead of New Zealand on mobile adoption and decoupling from landlines, but Rob Salmond thinks that within 5 years we will see these kinds of proportions in New Zealand. This will make current pollsters’ policies of refusing to call cell phones hugely problematic…

Stand up for fairness in & for NZ – TPPA, March 29

Written By: karol - Date published: 11:02 am, March 13th, 2014 - 6 comments

International, cronyist, corporate capitalism skews democratic processes in NZ, making it harder for the majority of battling Kiwis to get a fair go – harder to ensure all New Zealanders live in a society that works for them. The TPPA is a power-play between the US and other powerful countries. There’s nothing in it for NZ. National Day of action March 29th, 2014.

Five Eyes, One Network

Written By: karol - Date published: 12:32 pm, March 12th, 2014 - 60 comments

Edward Snowden revelations indicate that the US NSA pressured the NZ government to make last year’s hasty changes to the GCSB and TICS laws, to enable mass surveillance. John Key sometimes denies he knows of visits to NZ by the NSA’s Gen Keith Alexander – but Key would have to approve the visits.

NRT: Did the NSA write John Key’s spy bill?

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 1:20 pm, March 11th, 2014 - 16 comments

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden gave evidence to the European Parliament last week about the NSA and mass-surveillance. The most interesting revelation? The NSA’s use of lawyers to subvert other countries limits on surveillance – including our own. So what did GCSB receive “legal guidance” on? What about the careful loopholes in the new Act

NZ independence? back to the future

Written By: karol - Date published: 10:50 am, March 4th, 2014 - 150 comments

NZ seems like a client state of both US imperialism, and the UK monarchy: a throwback to the first part of the 20th century. John Key was quick to support the US & EU lines on the Crimea; some low achieving, British royals are visiting NZ at taxpayers’ expense.

Militarism and the NZ Left?

Written By: karol - Date published: 12:28 pm, February 28th, 2014 - 31 comments

Two uncritical articles in Auckland’s local press, raise questions about the role of the NZ military, and the educational and cultural impact of a military charter school. Unstated and unquestioned, is the nature of NZ’s relationship with that of militaristic US imperialism.

5 Eyes’ cyberwarfare: Snowden

Written By: karol - Date published: 7:55 am, February 9th, 2014 - 60 comments

Leaked by Edward Snowden, a GCHQ slideshow for a secret spy conference. It outlines methods of cyber warfare and propaganda circulation. Mainly aimed at non-5 Eyes’ countries, the methods include infiltrating blogs, DOS attacks, propaganda via social media & manipulating journalists.

Seeger “brought politics to music”

Written By: karol - Date published: 9:15 am, January 29th, 2014 - 23 comments

1919-2014: Gone but never forgotten. Songs for and of the people.

Obama’s TPPA bid to over-ride democracy

Written By: karol - Date published: 6:47 pm, January 10th, 2014 - 16 comments

There’s a tussle going on as Obama pushes to seal the deal and to limit Congress’s say on TPPA deals. But, Congress would still have more say about the deals than NZ MPs. It’s about democracy & sovereignty. It could slip under the radar over summer.

NRT: The NSA spies on its own government

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 11:11 am, January 8th, 2014 - 51 comments

Since Edward Snowden leaked proof of widespread NSA spying on US citizens, people have been wondering who exactly they’re spying on. Are they spying on their own government? Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders wanted to know, so he asked them directly. The response was not reassuring.

Perhaps the same question should be put to the GCSB? After all its oversight seems even more incompetent and incestuous than that of the NSA.

Enter the Zombie Apocalypse

Written By: lprent - Date published: 5:12 pm, January 5th, 2014 - 22 comments

Ah, heard this on weekend radio on radio NZ this afternoon. Perfect satire for the last US election. Beware the zombie apocalypse.

Hopefully our comedians and cartoonists will be equally inventive

Snowden performed a public service

Written By: lprent - Date published: 10:16 am, January 4th, 2014 - 99 comments

The New York Times has an editorial stating that Edward Snowden should be regarded as a whistleblower who has done the public there and elsewhere a service by revealing the illegal extent of the NSA’s surveillance. What is most interesting in the extremely well linked editorial is that there is this curious hole in the US whistle blower laws that many including Barack Obama have said he could have used. They don’t cover contractors….

Caption contest

Written By: karol - Date published: 10:31 am, January 3rd, 2014 - 110 comments

Celebrity golf! Which one will get voted off the island first!? Meanwhile the world burns, the poor struggle, and the wealth gap continues to be a blight on our country.

Polity: Who believes in climate change?

Written By: notices and features - Date published: 10:22 pm, December 29th, 2013 - 84 comments

Cool-yet-depressing finding on why some people change their mind on climate change from one day to the next.

It can be summarised by saying Republicans in the US are scientific morons, and many Americans decide based on the previous days weathers.

Populists v Plutocrats

Written By: Mike Smith - Date published: 8:15 pm, November 4th, 2013 - 12 comments

Democrat Bill de Blasio is almost 40 points clear of his Republican rival in the race for Mayor of New York City. His parents were investigated for communist sympathies. An anti-apartheid poster hangs on his kitchen wall. He loves Europe’s social democrats, admires Latin American liberation theology and is poised to confound the conservative trend in US politics by sweeping to an improbable triumph as the next Mayor of New York in this week’s elections. There are some lessons from our local elections too.

Avoiding the silly wars of the republic

Written By: lprent - Date published: 8:27 am, October 30th, 2013 - 60 comments

So the US military/diplomats has decided that we should be friends again after nearly 30 years. Whooptee do! Who really gives a pigs arse? Well I do. The republic in the USA gives all republics a bad name because of their habit of using military force for poorly thought-out ideological and even odd personal reasons. Someone to be wary of following blindly into one of their silly wars.

NSA: ‘full spectrum dominance’

Written By: karol - Date published: 9:39 am, October 28th, 2013 - 23 comments

Latest revelations about the NSA’s international surveillance show it is about “full spectrum dominance” of military, economic, business and political activities. The TICS Bill is the latest part of Key’s changes to NZ’s surveillance agencies, further enabling the US government dominance via NSA, especially in business & politics.

This is how it’s done

Written By: karol - Date published: 11:56 am, October 15th, 2013 - 37 comments

This morning Cunliffe shows how to front the media on current issues, and respond to journalists questions clearly and decisively while being informed on the issues. Questions about Kōhanga Reo National Trust, US government debt crisis, affordable housing, need better skills training, Euthanasia Bill.

Discourage the pantie sniffers

Written By: lprent - Date published: 9:01 pm, October 13th, 2013 - 30 comments

It isn’t that hard to get around the prurient arsehole peekers that populate the NSA and the kiwi puppets – John Key being a prime example. Encrypt, falsify your “metadata”, and send lots of crap purely so they have no idea what to look at. Hell – even the NZ Herald gets it these days as in an anonymously published article in the weekend rag…