Wheelers Corner 38 15th September 2018. Change of film date.

Wheeler's Corner 38 15th September 2018

Connecting people who care together

 1. Change of film showing date:

Because of some difficulty in getting the film from the US the date for its showing will now be the 14th [Sunday] of October at the Globe...so please change your diary entry:

Stanislav Petrov:

The documentary film 'The Man who Saved the World' with Stanislav Petrov, Kevin Costner, Robert De Niro, Matt Damon. Here is a trailer you can watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaPXVJWHji4

This film is being screened to commemorate the International Day for Peace (Sept 21) and the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons (Sept 26).

The Man Who Saved the World is a 2014 feature-length Danish documentary film by film maker Peter Anthony about Stanislav Petrov, a former lieutenant colonel of the Soviet Air Defence Forces and his role in preventing a nuclear reaction to a false alarm. 


2. What was the Council role in permitting the Expo here in Palmerston North: Here is the question I asked along with their response: 
  
Q: Under the Freedom of Information regulations [Act] can you please supply me with a copy of the original request to hold the NZ Defence Industry Association Forum from the 30 Oct to 1 Nov 2018 at the Central Energy Trust Arena in Palmerston North.

"Good afternoon Mr Wheeler

Following receipt of your email of August 15 we can supply the following information.
*Please note this information is supplied under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act 1987. The Freedom of Information Act is no longer in existence.

A: The original request was an unsolicited phone call in late February 2018 from Robert Martin from Event Mergers (a conference management company), requesting venue hire charges for a conference. No details were given on what the conference was. Information regarding venue costs were sent to Event Mergers on 22 February.

The Mayor stated 'that a catering company [Compass] was sponsoring this event', I have requested information as to who is the sponsor from Event Mergers in Auckland: I am awaiting a reply. In the meantime perhaps the Mayor can inform the public of just who this catering company is and is it for real, who owns it: So that we can contact the company and request that they do do the decent thing and maybe change their mind...a quick check of Compass shows that it has a military connection, here is what their web-site states: It obviously has a American link...

Defence  http://compass-group.co.nz/our-brands/ess/#

ESS defence clients work with us as a support services provider who understands the strategic challenges of running efficient and effective facilities and operations.
Millions of meals and rations are delivered through first-class dining facilities and mess halls and to troops training in the field, along with logistical and hospitality services to thousands of military and civilian personnel.
Our grounds maintenance staff maintain thousands of hectares of defence estate, including environmentally sensitive areas.
Our security services watch over high and medium level security facilities.
We manage vehicle fleets that include cars, buses, fire engines, ambulances and a wide variety of specialist vehicles.
Other specialised services  we perform for defence clients include the management of armouries, reprographics, warehousing, cinemas, gym and sporting facilities.

The Compass web site does not show the function at the Central Energy Trust arena:
https://www.compass.ac.nz/seminars-by-city/palmerston-north 
So who do we believe? Perhaps we should ask...who are they hiding, could it be Lockheed-Martin.

In actual fact what the PNCC Councillors could do if they found the courage, would be to move a notice of motion 'to have the council reconsider their approval' for the function being held at the council owned Central Energy Trust Arena at the end of October. 

One Councillor could move this so long as one other Councillor seconded the motion. It could then be debated in public and the public could at least have a say. Is that too much to ask?

A cartoon from the US election says it all.

3. A friend received this information via a new organization that has been formed in the US, it covers the area of military / police activity that has swept the US in the last few years. It proves how deadly it is to combine Military and Police in political goals...could it happen here in NZ...is it already happening. 

An example of what is contained in this investigation shows that: 
These exchange programs facilitate the sharing of practices and technologies between US law enforcement and Israeli military, police and intelligence agencies. They also introduce militarized logics of security into the civilian sphere, which rely on mass surveillance, criminalization, and violent repression of communities and movements the government defines as threatening. Finally, they deepen ties between US and Israeli officials to shore up support for a shared security model that justifies flagrant human and civil rights violations. Here is the report for you to consider:

"Dear, I am excited to tell you about a groundbreaking resource that was just released today. It has the power to transform organizing across the country! The resource, Palestine is Here, is a search engine created by a USCPR member group, Researching the American-Israeli Alliance, that maps the connections between US and Israeli state violence in your local city or town. Accompanying the database, RAIA is releasing a new research report for the Deadly Exchange campaign, tracing the dangerous consequences of 16 years of Israeli training of US law enforcement. The tool traces deadly exchanges of law enforcement between the US and Israel—including ICE agents and local police—that contribute to state violence across Palestine, in our streets, and at our borders. In our local communities, under the banner of “counter-terrorism,” these exchanges contribute to expanded surveillance and infiltration of social movements; racial profiling and refined tactics and technologies that target entire communities; and suppression of public protests through force. Living up to its name, Palestine is Here shows how Israel’s oppression of Palestinians is not just something happening on the other side of the world. Instead, that oppression is concretely intertwined with the oppression of Black, brown, indigenous, and other marginalized communities in the US through direct institutional alliances. Palestine Is Here will soon expand to map corporate, academic, military, and other local institutional links. Explore Palestine is Here

Across the US, people like you are committed to real safety and security through justice and solidarity rather than criminalization and incarceration. In the past few months, we celebrated when the San Francisco Bay Area Stop Urban Shield coalition successfully ended a massive SWAT training and weapons expo bringing together police-military units, including from Israel. We celebrated when the city of Durham, North Carolina, voted to ban police exchanges with Israel, the first in the nation to do so. You can be part of those wins for justice. By combining resources like the Palestine Is Here database and the Cities for Palestine toolkit, people like you can identify smart targets and build strategic campaigns aimed at the liberation of all people. Toward justice, ANNA BALTZER Director of Organizing and Advocacy P.S. You can learn more about Palestine is Here at USCPR’s national conference, Together We Rise, September 28-30 in St. Paul, Minnesota. There’s still time to register for this phenomenal event, which will include a “Resisting Global Policing: Disrupting US-Israel Exchanges” workshop featuring Palestine is Here, the Stop Urban Shield coalition, and more. See you there! 4.  I hope that if you live in PN you have posted off your vote in the Horizons by-election, I incorrectly enveloped my vote, so I got it delivered back, but I dropped it off at their office here in PN...I must be getting old!  The NZ political scene is really weird these days... with the Labour party trying to maintain its Roger Douglas Neo-lib behaviour while at the same time attempting to introduce some new people / worker changes that will satisfy their voters, Winston Peters continues down the populist track, the Greens tread lightly as they learn to live within the governing arrangement. The National Party are torn between acting tough on everything and continuing to carry the weight of an Act Party baggage like weird  Don Brash and company...while they seek new friends. My view is that in general we have yet to actually accept an election has taken place and that the country has accepted that first past the post has ended and that MMP is now the norm. I feel that the Maori language week has been a massive success. The progression toward a living wage has picked up speed and that at last our old rich main stream media crowd is disappearing by being swept up in a ball of fluff and digested by our vacuum cleaners.  Well that's it for this week, stay warm and look after yourselves for you are among the most important people in the world...why because all people are important.