On Obama and Key
I get a lot of emails from American readers about life in New Zealand. Here is the latest.
My husband & I spent a month in NZ Aug/Sep to see if we could live there if things get Really Dicey here. Question; Is John Key just naive about Obama, stupid or complicit??
I feel like he's naive but would love to know what you think. When he put the pics of him with Obama at the UN up on his Twitter account I became concerned.
Here's my reply;
I hope you enjoyed your stay here. I could open an immigration consultancy with the number of enquiries I get from concerned Americans.
Re John Key.
A very likeable guy, with many good personal qualities, but in my opinion a
little left leaning and very naïve on security matters.
John Key seems to think he is a Kiwi Obama-fresh faced underdog taking on the
establishment. He likes to compare himself to "The One" and would probably
have his babies if he could.
To be fair, that type of naivety is still very prevalent in a New Zealand, media trained to think all Republican presidents are in league with Satan.
John Key's father fought in the Spanish Civil war and spoke Russian-so its likely he was on the communist side. John's mother was an Austrian Jewess-a refugee from the Nazis-possibly also a leftist. Young John was raised by his widowed mother in State Housing, in one of the poorer suburbs of Christchurch.
So though John Key is a self made multi-millionaire, I suspect there are some lingering leftist sympathies in his psyche. I very much doubt that John Key would ever take a hard stand against the Chinese or any other significant threat to NZ.
I hope I'm wrong about that, but i don't think I am.
I think John Key, is a pretty benevolent chap and thinks that people like
president Obama and those nice people in Beijing see the world the same way.
Though I initially liked John Key a lot, I went a bit sour on him recently-mainly over his refusal to act on a referendum which showed overwhelming public support for
the lifting on New Zealand's ban on smacking children. Perhaps I'm a little biased?
I think New Zealand has a lot of advantages and I wouldn't live anywhere else, but if Obama succeeds in wrecking the US economy and downsizing the US military to Costa Rican levels, this country will rapidly be "Finlandized" (at best) by the Chinese and similar nice people.
To sum up, I don't think New Zealand can offer any better than temporary refuge, under the current leadership.
I see the strong possibility of civil unrest in America's future. New Zealand
would be a safe haven from that type of threat, but not in the context of the
overall geopolitical picture.
If the US goes down, the West goes down. That's my view.
Hope this helps.
What do you think of my analysis?
My husband & I spent a month in NZ Aug/Sep to see if we could live there if things get Really Dicey here. Question; Is John Key just naive about Obama, stupid or complicit??
I feel like he's naive but would love to know what you think. When he put the pics of him with Obama at the UN up on his Twitter account I became concerned.
Here's my reply;
I hope you enjoyed your stay here. I could open an immigration consultancy with the number of enquiries I get from concerned Americans.
Re John Key.
A very likeable guy, with many good personal qualities, but in my opinion a
little left leaning and very naïve on security matters.
John Key seems to think he is a Kiwi Obama-fresh faced underdog taking on the
establishment. He likes to compare himself to "The One" and would probably
have his babies if he could.
To be fair, that type of naivety is still very prevalent in a New Zealand, media trained to think all Republican presidents are in league with Satan.
John Key's father fought in the Spanish Civil war and spoke Russian-so its likely he was on the communist side. John's mother was an Austrian Jewess-a refugee from the Nazis-possibly also a leftist. Young John was raised by his widowed mother in State Housing, in one of the poorer suburbs of Christchurch.
So though John Key is a self made multi-millionaire, I suspect there are some lingering leftist sympathies in his psyche. I very much doubt that John Key would ever take a hard stand against the Chinese or any other significant threat to NZ.
I hope I'm wrong about that, but i don't think I am.
I think John Key, is a pretty benevolent chap and thinks that people like
president Obama and those nice people in Beijing see the world the same way.
Though I initially liked John Key a lot, I went a bit sour on him recently-mainly over his refusal to act on a referendum which showed overwhelming public support for
the lifting on New Zealand's ban on smacking children. Perhaps I'm a little biased?
I think New Zealand has a lot of advantages and I wouldn't live anywhere else, but if Obama succeeds in wrecking the US economy and downsizing the US military to Costa Rican levels, this country will rapidly be "Finlandized" (at best) by the Chinese and similar nice people.
To sum up, I don't think New Zealand can offer any better than temporary refuge, under the current leadership.
I see the strong possibility of civil unrest in America's future. New Zealand
would be a safe haven from that type of threat, but not in the context of the
overall geopolitical picture.
If the US goes down, the West goes down. That's my view.
Hope this helps.
What do you think of my analysis?
Labels: Barack Obama, John Key
posted by Trevor Loudon at
11/16/2009 10:45:00 AM
9 Comments:
And you have no gun rights.
Americans can't come here and try to determine what things are like judging by American standards. John Key posing with the "celebrity President" and posting it on Twitter doesn't mean he is an American-style Obamatron. New Zealand lives and dies by trade. For them, the US means trade (and secondarily defence), and if there is a new face in the White House that might be more amenable to moving that along (that is, finally sign a FTA), then that is nothing but Really Great News for New Zealand.
Also, I'm really not sure what exactly John Key would be "complict" in -- what he does or thinks about Obama has absolutely no bearing on anything Obama does at home nor his standing in the world. That's the main political difference to get used to if you're American and you move to New Zealand -- you're coming from a country whose actions regularly affect the whole world, to a country that doesn't really have the ability to affect much in the world.
On the other hand, the people who live here seem to have much more ability to affect their own government, which is a far, far cry from how things are in the US, and a great improvement as far as I'm concerned. You'd be amazed how much more transparency there is in government when there are 4 million people instead of 300 million.
Americans thinking of coming to NZ must be crazy. I would move to the US tomorrow if allowed.
Your constitution is the light in the world. Stay and fight to keep freedom. There's none here.
I moved to Auckland from Chicago 2 years ago. Your site is great - my kiwi husband 'gets' me, but not too many other NZers do.
Your Key v Obama analysis is pretty on target Trevor.
Echoing what Easter says, I see John Key just keeping up a happy relationship with the USA (no matter who is in charge). NZ needs the USA to trade with. NZ even ships back known terrorists after they kill someone: French bombed the Greenpeace boat, right, but NZ need to resume trading with France!
NZ needs all trade partners it can get (IMO).
I don't think Mr. Key, nor majority of NZ, is actually reading the alternative USA media (eg internet blogs/news) which shows how much turmoil the USA is in right now.
Was the huge 12-Sep-09 1.2 million people march on Washington covered much by NZ media? I may have seen a blip. Not that protests are doing anything to affect the W.House. Miss Boss N. Pelosi will NOT stop until all her agendas push through. America will have a LOT of mess to clean up in 2010 and 2012 if she survives.
NZ still seems naive about what America is all about. EG heard on Radiolive: last Fri AM, Marcus Lush spoke to American rapper/singer M.C. Hammer and asked him how did he think Obama was doing? Of course Hammer says "oh, well he inherited so many problems, but I think he is doing a great job..." (WTF?! I almost drove off the road yelling at the radio...)
So can't fault NZ if they don't really know what is going on.
Hell, lots of idiot Americans don't even know what is going on. Esp hollywood types...
Alas, America is a nation of fighters and won't go 'down' quietly. Trust me on that: gun sales been through the ROOF since Nov 2008.
(P.S. Chicago ain't all bad: http://saucyusa.blogspot.com/2009/08/in-defense-of-chicago.html)
Eastertheatre. I have no problem w/ trade deals if that is all that was going on straight up. I am concerned that Key doesn't seem to understand Obama's a pathological liiar. He lies about just about everything and then goes back on just about every promise. He lied to the American public during the campaign. He sold himself as a moderate democrat when he's so far left nearly ALL his associations are socialists or commies. Key needs to be made aware a) the man is no moderate, b) anything he promises today can be thrown under bus tomorrow if he changes his mind, and c) because his popularity is dropping like a rock he won't be re-elected unless he stops doing what he has been doing has a policy epiphany.
As for anonomyous - our beloved constitution... Obama is on tape saying it's a seriously flawed document because it only says what the govt CAN'T do to the people. He says he thinks it should say what the govt must do FOR the people. Obama complains on this tape that the founding fathers didn't address the redistribution of wealth. He and people in his admin want to add a second Bill of rights that will effectively do this - redistribute the wealth.
He has people that meet w/ him almost weekly, Andy Stern of Service Employees Union INTERNATIONAL that are on tape saying they want to redistribute the weath globally & have set up branches all around the world to do just that. Andy Stern who meets with Obama is fond of saying "Workers of the World Unite."
For those of you in NZ just imagine being here knowing that you are trying to defend human freedom on 2 fronts. Creeping Communism and Radical Islam both of which consider defeating the USA Republic their top prize. Add 2 that the pressure on our southern border with the violent Mexican Drug Cartels that will rush the border if things get dicey here.
Nearly every week across the contiguous 48 states there are large protests of this governments policies. So far they have all been peaceful. I have never seen this many protests ever here.
Thanks for "listening."
Read Saul Alinsky's book Rules for Radicals. Obama went to the Saul Alinsky school. (Alinsky held 15 week courses). Alinsky talks in this book about how it's so hard to train really good Community Organizers. He describes what makes a good community organizer. He explains that a good radical doesn't look like a radical because Americans will never accept communism. He explains that a good radical looks like everyone else (respectable) and that they are able to lie convincingly. It's obvious after reading this book why this group of radicals who took over the Democrat Party & now the White House choose Obama to be their frontman - he's a Master at Alinsky's method. He lies very convincingly. But Alinsky & this group of radicals didn't account for 2 major things 1) You Tube they're all over You tube spouting their communist/socialist crap , & 3) they misjudged the "change" we wanted & that we'd make sacrifices to defend the Founding Fathers version of this country/constitution.
Well if we have two ‘left leaning’ governments as you assert – then may they continue to negotiate the overdue free-trade agreement between our countries – the one The Bush administration (right wing presumably in your books?) stonewalled. As hard is this must be for you Trevor, as an ACT man you should be applauding the Obama administrations initiative towards free-trade.
To damn a politician like Key (who I didn’t vote for by the way) for continuing with one piece of legislation his government inherited and is working (per last weeks report) seems very myopic.
Key’s integrity is still intact – which is more than can be said for Rodney ‘small head rules big head’ Hide.
See ya.
Paul.
Excellent post Trevor. Spot on.
Every day here in the US seems more alarming than the last. I'm alarmed by Obama and his minions -- and learn so much background material from this blog.
I've thought of fleeing -- although I haven't the money for it. Would love to, since I am to a great extent something of a coward. Some days (like today) I'm depressed and horribly depleted by the unending fights ahead of us -- with no sense that anyone is bloomin' listening.
There are fascist beatings beginning to happen -- one in St. Louis, MO (Gladney beaten by SEIU thugs), California (have missed the details on that one, but just heard mentions of it,) and most lately in Florida. The Gladney case has somehow disappeared from the criminal cases in MO.
The "Progressives" and the Marxists (same thing) have infiltrated everywhere here. While many people APPEAR oblivious, I think some are awakening.
Truly, though, our Congress won't stand up to these people -- nor will our Courts. The Constitution is such an incredible document, but its becoming unhinged. By ideologues, by greed, by a fear of reprisals and loss, by bewilderment and exhaustion, by the refusal of those elected and BEING PAID by taxpayers to DO WHAT THEY SWORE TO DO -- uphold and defend that Constitution.
We're losing our dear America. Have thought about New Zealand myself.
Instead, I pick myself up. Call my Senators and Representatives. Have some staffers interrupt me, others argue with me, most probably playing Solitaire on the Computer while I talk.
Instead, I forward articles and emails.
Instead, I get through this one little day -- and pray that the next will bring a ray of hope, some shred of evidence that somebody in a position to effect the direction of this nation has found a little chutzpah.
God Bless you, Trevor. Your blog brings me a bit of hope on a grey day.
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