Posts Tagged ‘GCSB’

Images of the GCSB scandal

Written By: - Date published: 11:10 am, April 12th, 2013 - 9 comments

Check out Bryce Edward’s latest images of the GCSB scandal…
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ImperatorFish: A statement from the Prime Minister

Written By: - Date published: 11:55 am, April 11th, 2013 - 2 comments

The Government Security (Doing As They Please) Bill will be introduced next week, and this important piece of legislation will make it clear that our security and law enforcement agencies must operate within the framework of doing anything they want.

The Key-Fletcher trail

Written By: - Date published: 11:36 am, April 11th, 2013 - 77 comments

The PM, Fletcher, the GCSB – questions need answering: why, when, where, who? It’s all about intellectual property, global commerce and international networks. From London to Aus 2009, to NZ 2010, then down the rabbit hole to Dotcom, Hobbits & uncertain links with complex global money mazes.

Key’s Nixon moment

Written By: - Date published: 6:15 am, April 11th, 2013 - 55 comments

Nixon famously said: “When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal”. John Key would have you believe the same thing, that when his agency, the GCSB, has been breaking the law, the problem lies with the law. No – the problem lies with the GCSB and its oversight. Watergate here we come…

Kitteridge report released

Written By: - Date published: 4:46 pm, April 9th, 2013 - 42 comments

Following the leaking of the Kitteridge GCSB report to the media (who had copies? who leaked?) and ructions in Parliament’s question time today, the report has been released early. (Very convenient timing for the Nats!)

Fletcher GCSB Change manager – and QLD

Written By: - Date published: 10:38 am, April 5th, 2013 - 87 comments

Key & a government source responded to Ferguson’s criticisms by attacking Labour & Ferguson.  They claimed Fletcher was the best person to “change manage” the GCSB. Yet, in Queensland Fletcher was publicly criticised for the management of his department. [Updated]

Rennie: Key vetoed the shortlist?

Written By: - Date published: 2:58 pm, April 4th, 2013 - 115 comments

Rennie now says it was ultimately Key’s decision to scrap the original shortlist for head of the GCSB.  Has Key misled the House and the country, or has he successfully employed the science of obfuscation?

GCSB cover-up an “operational matter”

Written By: - Date published: 9:25 am, March 21st, 2013 - 19 comments

The extent of the GCSB cover-up in the Dotcom fiasco is now clear. Key is pleading ignorance, claiming that it was an “operational matter”. If Key isn’t briefed on “operational matters” then what possible oversight can he provide? In fact he was briefed on this “operational matter” – the only question is when…

Billy Big Stepper

Written By: - Date published: 6:54 am, March 20th, 2013 - 27 comments

Our wee James Bond wannabes had a code name for Kim Dotcom (you know, in case their comms were intercepted by the bad guys). They called him Billy Big Stepper. So witty! But Labour’s uncovered something more serious too. It seems that the GCSB was aware in February that they may have broken the law and went into a quite a tizz, before covering it up.

Mega-screenshots promise more embarassment

Written By: - Date published: 11:29 am, December 10th, 2012 - 6 comments

Kim DotCom has been twittering about his new website that is under development to the amusement of some observers. But for us in NZ we’re probably less interested in the layout of his file manager than what is actually in the screenshot of the file manager. Promises yet more pain for the government and it’s inept police and security services.

A trip down faulty memory lane

Written By: - Date published: 8:45 pm, October 17th, 2012 - 69 comments

One of the fishy elements of the GCSB-Dotcom-Key saga is Key’s suddenly very faulty memory. It’s unbelievable what he’s forgotten about such a major issue. Here’s a partial list of things Key can’t recall, isn’t sure about, or doesn’t know – just from his answers in the House and just the last 3 days of questions. Update: got to tip my hat to Te Reo Putake’s name for the PM: ‘DunnoKeyo’

None so blind

Written By: - Date published: 10:42 am, October 17th, 2012 - 43 comments

Yesterday, John Key told Parliament in endless detail exactly what the GCSB did trying to check if there is any video of him talking about Dotcom. He knew all of that front to back. But, when it came to a simple question: ‘when did the GCSB realise they had broken the law in spying on Dotcom’. He had no idea. It’s incredible that he hasn’t bothered to learn such a basic fact.

Fran’s fracas

Written By: - Date published: 9:48 am, October 17th, 2012 - 131 comments

Well, Fran Mold has done it now. She’s got Shearer to go large (it is alleged) based on her man’s claim that there is a tape of Key talking to the GCSB in February about Dotcom. But no proof’s emerged. All Fran’s foul-up has done is give Key a breather and put Shearer on the ropes.You don’t get a bigger fuck-up than that as a spin doctor. I can’t imagine she’ll be around much longer.

The incredibly incurious and forgetful Mr Key

Written By: - Date published: 9:21 pm, October 11th, 2012 - 144 comments

“So what?” says Key as allegations emerge from within GCSB that Key cracked jokes about the spooks’ (illegal) involvement in the Dotcom raid when he was briefed by them on February 29th. It either means you realised their spying and are incompetent for not questioning its legality or that you knew all about the illegal spying and didn’t care – that’s what.

Watch Campbell Live at 7pm

Written By: - Date published: 6:39 pm, October 11th, 2012 - 103 comments

Apparently there’s a tape of Key mentioning Dotcom on February 29th. Another bit of Key’s story collapses? Watch Campbell Live at 7 for more…

Key’s growing Dotcom problem

Written By: - Date published: 9:00 am, October 10th, 2012 - 29 comments

People don’t just vote for politicians because they like their policies. Just as important are trust and perceived competence. Key’s policies were never popular. He won on the other two – particularly trust. That’s why the Dotcom saga is so ruining for him. As more details of what Key knew or should have known come out day by day, perceptions of Key’s competence and trust in him plummet.

From cock-up to cover-up

Written By: - Date published: 12:30 pm, October 6th, 2012 - 49 comments

The narrative that the Government has tried to sell, and which has been largely accepted to date, is that the GCSB’s illegal spying on Dotcom was a cock-up. They claimed that Key wasn’t briefed, when he was. The Nats also claimed only a change in immigration law in 2009 protected Dotcom. Now, we know that’s rubbish. Cover-up it is.

A red herring?

Written By: - Date published: 10:19 am, October 4th, 2012 - 23 comments

Call me cynical but I just don’t think it’s credible that it took over two weeks after Key supposedly learned of the GCSB’s involvement in the Dotcom raid before they realised he given a presentation featuring Dotcom by GCSB a month after the raid. They’re amateur, they’re not that amateur. No, I think the ‘presentation on a laptop screen’ is a red herring.

One video exposes Key, GCSB’s & Banks’ Dotcom lies

Written By: - Date published: 7:35 am, October 4th, 2012 - 115 comments

Watch this video of John Key being interviewed by the media on January 24th. 1: Key is clearly well-briefed on Dotcom. 2: he knows that Dotcom is a resident, so why didn’t he raise that a month later with GCSB? 3: How did Key know that Dotcom was a resident and GCSB didn’t? 4: Banks has told media he had dined at the mansion with Dotcom – months before denying remembering that meeting.

NRT: Convenient amnesia

Written By: - Date published: 1:00 pm, October 3rd, 2012 - 115 comments

What can one say to the latest. No Right Turn says…..
“So, having told everyone that he wasn’t briefed about the Kim Dotcom spying fiasco until September, it now turns out that John Key was told about it back in February. ” … “That whistling noise is the PM’s credibility shrinking even further. His amnesia is just too convenient here to be believed”

Updated: Added links to his next two posts.

Planet Key receding from reality at light speed

Written By: - Date published: 7:03 am, October 3rd, 2012 - 37 comments

Law enforcement on Planet Key must be a strange business: “Mr Key says he called in the police on the teapot tapes because he wanted to find out if there had been an offence. He argues Dotcom is different, because his Government has already admitted what it did was unlawful.” So, what do the Planet Key Police do they do when they catch a crim? Tag him and let him go?

Update: Breaking news – we all expected this didn’t we – Key was briefed on the Dotcom case in February.

Key changes tune, orders GCSB review

Written By: - Date published: 7:15 am, October 2nd, 2012 - 71 comments

Last week, Key tried to tell us that the illegal spying on Kim Dotcom – which he, the minister, we’re supposed to believe wasn’t told about for 8 months – was down to one agent’s ‘brain fade’. Uh huh. So, why has he now appointed a senior public servant to review and reform GCSB? You don’t do that when the problem was one person’s human error.

[Update: Lol at Key. Police are launching a high powered inquiry after he said there was no need for one]

Where are the resignations?

Written By: - Date published: 10:12 am, September 30th, 2012 - 87 comments

John Key refuses to accept any responsibility for what his spies get up to. The only point of democratic responsibility for our spies doesn’t monitor them and won’t take the blame for failing to do so. He won’t fire a corrupt, lying minister, either. The rot is spreading to the public service. There has been not one resignation, not a single one, due to the Dotcom debacle.

Neazor report proves inadequate cover for Key

Written By: - Date published: 9:23 am, September 29th, 2012 - 83 comments

Labour has written to Key calling for a much wider-ranging investigation into the Dotcom spying affair than Neazor’s narrow, tell-us-nothing-we-don’t-already-know report. They would have been better to go straight to the Auditor-General. The Greens have gone for the established illegality and called in the cops on the GCSB – cleverly citing the same offence Key claimed in the teapot tapes.

A fish rots from the head down

Written By: - Date published: 1:50 pm, September 25th, 2012 - 51 comments

Key has failed to uphold high ethical standards for himself, his Ministers, or his government. The GCSB illegal spying fiasco is just the latest example.

Cynical Key

Written By: - Date published: 11:31 pm, September 24th, 2012 - 134 comments

So Key knew about the GCSB’s ‘unlawful’ actions for a week before he bothered to tell us. He happened to know that this Monday state owned companies would be announcing they were causing the loss of 500-600 jobs. Only one story would get its full due of airtime.