Tag Archives: Barack Obama

Barack Obama Has New Zealand Favourites

Barack Obama Has New Zealand Favourites

Among former president Barack Obama’s recommended summer reads for beach, porch or sun lounger is New Zealand author Eleanor Catton’s Birnam Wood, Martin Pengelly reports for The Guardian. “Here’s some books that I’m reading this summer,”…

Like Obama Allbirds Have Widespread Centrist Appeal

Like Obama Allbirds Have Widespread Centrist Appeal

Monthly men’s magazine GQ highlights former US president Barack Obama’s penchant for Allbirds, a wool trainer created by New Zealander Tim Brown and American Joey Zwillinger, and a Silicon Valley go-to. According to style feature…

Obama Gets His Allbirds On

Obama Gets His Allbirds On

They say you can judge a man by his shoes, according to The Telegraph’s Tamara Abraham, so when Barack Obama stepped out in the south of France in June, a handful of eagle-eyed fans were…

Thomasin McKenzie Reflects on Breakout Year

Thomasin McKenzie Reflects on Breakout Year

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, 18-year-old Wellingtonian Thomasin McKenzie reflects on her breakout year (after Debra Granik’s latest film Leave No Trace premiered at Sundance, she shot four other films), frequent comparisons…

Jacinda Ardern on Life as a Leader

Jacinda Ardern on Life as a Leader

In a Guardian interview, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern reveals how her life has changed and her ambition for a can-do country. This time last year Ardern was known as a young opposition MP…

Anna Wilding Recalls Time in The White House Press Corps   

Anna Wilding Recalls Time in The White House Press Corps   

“Marine One had just landed on the South Lawn and Anna Wilding was standing 20 feet away among the press with her camera in hand, ready to capture the 44th president head back into…

Obama Picks Gin Wigmore for Summer Playlist

Obama Picks Gin Wigmore for Summer Playlist

New Zealand musician Gin Wigmore’s “Man Like That” has made President Barack Obama’s “hand-selected” summer playlist, alongside classics from Aretha Franklin, Miles Davis and Prince, and more recent artists Common, Jay Z and Wale. The…

Leaders Discuss Progress Report on Trans-Pacific Trade

Leaders Discuss Progress Report on Trans-Pacific Trade

At the White House meeting between Prime Minister John Key and President Barack Obama this week, the two leaders discussed a timeline to complete the Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade deal agreement by November when the…

US President Obama and PM John Key enjoy golf game in Hawaii

US President Obama and PM John Key enjoy golf game in Hawaii

In a rare vacation encounter with a foreign official, US President Barack Obama played golf in Hawaii with a new partner, Prime Minister John Key also on vacation, along with Key’s teenage son Max…

From the Top and On Fire

From the Top and On Fire

New Zealander Victoria Ransom is chief executive of Wildfire, a provider of social media marketing software, which was acquired by Google last year. In an interview with Adam Bryant of The…

In Favour of Marriage

In Favour of Marriage

New Zealand lawmakers have overwhelmingly cast a first vote in favour of a gay marriage bill that was given impetus by President Barack Obama’s public support of the issue. The 80 to 40 vote…

Enduring Friendship

Enduring Friendship

New Zealand has the “enduring friendship and support of many partners around the world,” President Obama said in a White House statement. Obama offered his “deepest condolences” to the people of New Zealand and…

Paradigm shift

Paradigm shift

“New Zealand is very much within the US ‘Sphere of Influence” and Clinton just confirmed it by signing the high-profile Wellington Declaration,” Balaji Chandramohan writes for the Diplomatic Courier. “This is the first…

Obama in multigrain

Obama in multigrain

Paeroa-born artist Maurice Bennett, famous throughout New Zealand for portraits made from toast, has recently unveiled his latest piece. Bennett’s Barack Obama portrait required over 12 pieces of toast, including white, whole wheat, and…

Shared Heritage

Shared Heritage

“Canada and New Zealand may lie at opposite ends of the earth, but we are bound together by a common history,” Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper declared during John Key’s visit to the capital…

Briefing to Incoming Ministers

Briefing to Incoming Ministers

The wonderful thing about those of us who enjoy democracy, we are currently told, is that we enjoy the fruits of an orderly and peaceful transfer of power between governing regimes. I’ve got to tell…