The more they cry wolf, the sooner and more profound the destruction of their credibility.

The crucial question is what will they leave in their wake: law that few trust and respect; and a Tory government with no opposition.

I predict a lot of riots in the coming years.

At one time the BBC was the only effective opposition we had but it was emasculated by the Hutton Report and the ousting of Greg Dyke. Now, if you want to know what’s going on you’ve got Al Jazeera (although that has its own problems of bias and doesn’t really report in detail on UK news), or Channel 4 News.

Sickening indeed. The other day the attempted assassination of the Bolivian leader Morales was also given about 5 seconds on the BBC world news. Yet when Obama merely sneezes its a 5 minute segment.

Interesting article by Simon Jenkins in today’s Guardian (http://tinyurl.com/cnbmgf), which makes some similar points.

Keep up the good work, Craig.

Good going BBC, that other highly regarded independent news agency akin to CNN and the like.

I like how all those victims (men, women and children) of the drone killings in Pakistan are causing confusion as they are all referred to as ‘Collateral Damage’.

Better stop now Obama, your necks on the line for this one…..I dont think you’ll be able to defend this one on any sort of justification, but hey the previous incumbent of your job certainly tried….how funny things turn around …eventually.

Good luck on the 28th Craig…..gonna to try and get down…..what time? and where is it?

Convenient co-incidence of budget news today may be more prominent? Think not.

This is a lot like what happened with the recent arrests in the Netherlands. It was international news that some people had been arrested, were of Moroccan descent, and ‘had ties to the Madrid bombings.’ When it was revealed a couple of days later that the source was unreliable and the people were released without charge, I could only find this news on Dutch sites.

I’m not sure that it’s propaganda so much as that retractions aren’t news (consider the ‘autism jab’ in the UK; fits the theory of news outlets not wanting to publicize retractions, does not fit the theory of government propaganda).

To be perfectly fair, Radio 4 did cover the release in somewhat more detail.

But, yes, Auntie had her legs cut out from under her by NuLabour and has been given her marching orders. Had there been riots in the streets as a result, perhaps things might have been different, but nobody seems to care.

As long as news has to sell or is guided by political agenda, it will always be sensational rather than educational and balanced.

We see the same in science and humanities programs in the last decade; presumably modern education is following the same route.

Are we in the grey region prior to a new dark age?

I am less sure. This site is heading about 70,000 unique visitors in April, of whom about 25,000 are first time visitors. As it is not publicised at all, I think the vast majority of people who would agree with it don’t find it. And compare our 70,000 to the 100,000 Iain Dale gets for his infinitely more publicised blog.

These have become standard tactics. Remember the tanks at Heathrow timed to coincide with the massive anti-war marches? The deportation of these 9 people is also a standard tactic to get the public to think they must have been guilty of something. The case of Hicham Yezza is another example.

Not a day goes by when I do not rejoice that I left Britain six years ago.

“All of 12 men arrested over a suspected bomb plot in the UK have now been released without charge by police.” BBC website 10.59 am

How laughably pathetic! One hour before the budget. They’re digging hard to bury that bad news.

Has the word ‘innocent’ been removed from the latest edition of the Newspeak dictionary?

Dissent IS being shut down. This came yesterday about a protest planned for this morning.

Subject: POLICE SHUT DOWN BUDGET PROTEST… DEMONSTRATE OUTSIDE TREASURY 5PM-7PM!

http://www.theircrisisnotours.org.uk

POLICE SHUT DOWN 11.30AM PROTEST… DEMONSTRATE OUTSIDE TREASURY 5PM-7PM!

The police have refused to authorise our planned demonstration on Whitehall at 11.30am and have made clear that, if it takes place, the organiser will be liable to arrest and imprisonment for up to a year.

To avoid any police action against protesters turning up, we have been forced to cancel this demonstration.

Our protest from 5pm-7pm outside the Treasury (1 Horse Guards Road, London SW1A 2HQ ?” click link for map) will still take place. Please spread the word and attend the protest to demand a People’s Bailout.

We will also be going ahead with our 7.30pm Question Time event with John McDonnell MP, economist Graham Turner and others in Committee Room 10, House of Commons.

Make sure you come along and exercise your right to protest.

Best wishes,

Owen Jones – Campaign Convenor

——————–

To reply to this message, follow the link below:

http://www.facebook.com/n/?inbox/readmessage.php&t=77949919479&mid=57e116G2148d88cG18ca24fG0

___

All 12 now released without charge (to no-one’s great surprise)…

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8011341.stm

Mary

It has alsways been the case that demonstrations require police approval in advance. That is part of the normal democratic protest and it has worked reasonably well for years. See the Met’s wesbite. My guess is that this protest did not seek permission. The policing of G20 may have been wrong and unlawful on occasions but the police do have a responsibility to maintain order and the licensing system for demos is sensible.

http://www.met.police.uk/events/

Craig

These increased numbers of visitors are very heartening, and bear witness to the value of speaking truth to power.

But is anyone else listening? I’m still very pessimistic about the continuing ability of Labour to sustain its lies about terrorism, ably abeted by the “Dead Tree Press” and BBC.

I still think the vast majority believe them, or at least don’t want to disbelieve them.

“La, la, la, I’m not listening” seems to be the refrain.

We’ll get a better idea when we se how the media cover your SC appearance, I guess.

Your first piece took me by surprise and now your analysis proved to be correct! I give you full mark

It seems Brown sacrificed those poor men for propaganda purpuses, while Blair used to deploy the Army around Airport, showing himself protecting the ocuntry against terrorists who may even think of existing

Blair tactics save money.

I’m surprised the media aren’t going to town more on the fact these men have been released, though it is still early in that regard. I’m sure many will make the most of it. But usually it’s given huge coverage when they don’t make charges against high profile arrests.

I think the reason is this.

It’s getting much harder to make the claim that such arrests were done because the government and police decided to scare everybody for their own evil purposes. We all now know that when charges are not made, it can ONLY be hugely damaging to the police as we have seen in previous cases. The media is now maturing and understands that it’s simply absurd to claim they are trying to get some sort of PR advantage out of a situation which is always transparently bad PR for them and damages relations with the Muslim community, so there is much less silliness about this and williness not to make that worse than it needs to be.

We know too that it’s important that the police stay proactive and disrupt plots at an early stage. It’s harder to pretend this is not important anymore. Lets face it, when lives are at stake it is very important to follow up leads. The Islamophobic backlash from a successful terror attack will be a lot worse than a case being dropped.

Jess

Twelve innocent people’s lives have just beem ruined. Your pathetic attempt at a NuLab spin on the media participation in this propaganda exercise can’t take that fact away.

Does anybody doubt they were held till Budget Day as a piece of news management?

Jess

Welcome back – not.

Relativism is a curious beast. Yes the Beeb is a stinking festering carbuncle of sulphurous yellow journalism, capitalising on it’s light – read trivial, entertainment battalion, but the Beeb under Dyke was crap as well. Don’t credit the idiot Please. He resigned because a single employee did something good in the Beeb for pity’s sake, and allowed the grubbyment to crap all over what remnants of proper journalism remained.

Lest anyone think that the UK isn’t taking its (non-) marching orders from the US, here’s Naomi Wolfe explaining why protest in the US no longer works.

http://dancewater.blogspot.com/2009/04/naomi-klein-fake-protests-due-to.html

Really, if you want to know what the government is going to do, or what Tory/NuLabour talking points are going to be, just watch Fox News. These people have no imagination; American fast food, television, fashion, consumerism, and politics: it’s taken over everything and it makes me ill.

Jess actually makes me wonder about a particular scenario here. I have absolutely no knowledge of the particular case so let’s make up an imaginary scenario. Let’s say a bunch of Pakistani students are studying in the UK. Let’s further say (for example) that they are loudly proclaiming that the West is rubbish, women should do what they’re told and walk around completely covered, death is a reasonable punishment for apostasy, Hitler had the right idea, homosexuals should be burned at the stake, and converting people to Islam by conquest is entirely reasonable. In that imaginary scenario, it seems entirely right and proper that those hypothetical people should be made to piss off back to where they came from and not abuse our hospitality any further. (I am widely travelled myself, and always keep my head down whilst abroad and respect the ways of the country I am visiting.) What is *not* the right thing to do, in my imaginary scenario, is to go after the brats using terrorism legislation, and cynically using the action for political purposes.

The Muslim community are showing great reserve in not striking back, given the amount of provocation they’ve suffered.

Would it be immoral to hold a sweepstake on when the first revenge killing of a bobby takes place?

And why don’t the police themselves protest about these silly operations; even soldiers during war have the right to disobey immoral orders.

One more thing. Craig, you make repeated references to the fact you think there are terrorists out there, and doubtless a few other probably hold that opinion also. But I find it very frustrating that if they believe, then why don’t they ever examine the reasons why?

It’s STATE SPONSORED TERRORISM that’s the root problem and is the thing people should fear – as 60m brits are slowly learning (if they haven’t been conditioned appropriately…

“If you don’t want to be tortured, spied upon, robbed of all your money, in agreement with underfunded schools and closing hospitals, no pilfered pension, you’re holocaust denying, anti-Semite”

lwtc247

Of course terrorism exists. And of course terrorism is, broadly speaking, borne out of the reaction to injustice. But that does not justify violence against civilians – by ndividuals or states.

I’ve been concerned with BBC news for a few years now. Some of the subtle stuff I have seen on BBC Breakfast has caused me great alarm. They probably think a fair few folk watch it that don’t watch the other news in the day. Let’s start identifying the ‘individuals’ that are running the agenda and writing the scripts! Let’s make it clear we are looking at them! Let’s ask them who is pulling their strings! Let’s make it clear they better take notice of us and do their job properly! Like Craig said about Amnesty sending faxes to dodgy politicians, this sort of tactic can work. Obviously no correspondence can be physically threatening and no such action is intended. We are all the same. Humanity. A small, sick element is dividing us and conquering us!

Craig. Whether it exists wasn’t the issue. And the ‘weightage’ of your answer proves my point, unless grubbyments have somehow been the victim of injustice that is.

‘Of course terrorism exists. And of course terrorism is, broadly speaking, borne out of the reaction to injustice. But that does not justify violence against civilians – by ndividuals or states.’

Islamic fundamentalism terrorism never existed, as we have been told, and if any does now surface it is ‘solely’ our doing. High up tossers are pulling our strings. Bin Laden is the big, bad BOGEY MAN. Everyone needs to do as Jessy exhorted us. I have him on record. Don’t believe everything you read and logically question everything! I’m off to hide under my bed.

“Twelve innocent people’s lives have just beem ruined.Your pathetic attempt at a NuLab spin on the media participation in this propaganda exercise can’t take that fact away.”

Firstly, their lives haven’t been ruined. They will simply go back to Pakistan. But lets be realistic. It’s very likely indeed that the security services had a high degree of intelligence on these people. Just because the police believe they haven’t got enough to get a conviction in a British court doesn’t mean everything is fine and dandy.

As for media manipulation and propaganda, that’s quite simply ridiculous. This type of story only hurts the police. You know that, I know that, we all know that. It should be our job as intelligent people not to fuel absurd conspiracy theories and instead try to explain to ignorant people why such things will happen at a time when other major plots have been stopped. It’s just not realistic to expect 100% success on every occasion – lets stop lying about this.

As for budget day, even more people catch the news on a day like today, thus even more people will now about this story. We know our media in particular only highlights a story even more if they think it’s being burried – they fucking hate that – so you don’t have to worry about that.

Eddie 11.32 am

As I understand it, permission was asked for and it was refused.

Same old same old lies…

Are we surprised though? I think not.We all surely know by now the pattern of lies,media-spin and ruined lives of wholly innocent people.

Yet another lie in the series of MASSIVE LIES that is the hallmark of the idiot-grotesque War On Turr,Inc.

As ‘The Jessy’ said. Don’t believe what you read and logically question everything. Jessy you are a big muppet. All you are doing here is opening eyes even more with a feeble display of spook tactics.

‘so you don’t have to worry about that.’

You think you are talking to school children or something? Who are you Jessy? Who pays your wages? You seem a little more than a regular idiot, but no less idiotic.

“As ‘The Jessy’ said. Don’t believe what you read and logically question everything.”

Keeping a critical mind doesn’t mean you have to be fucking stupid. By now any intelligent person would have realised that the police are at great pains to make these types of arrests precisely because of the backlash in the media and from the Muslim community. Nothing good can come out of it. It’s time you used that critical mind to question people who are determined to exploit this difficult situation.

Start to think for yourself instead of buying into lazy conspiracy theories that don’t add up.

Jaded, the website Medialens is set up to address the hypocrisy and poor standards of journalism of todays media.I think it fits your suggestion well.

Ha, ‘lazy conspiracy theory’, that’s settled then.

Dr John Reid, the ‘conspiracy theorist’:

http://preview.tinyurl.com/cfbqu5

Says Jess:

> As for media manipulation and propaganda, that’s

> quite simply ridiculous. This type of story only

> hurts the police. You know that, I know that, we

> all know that.

Well, I regard myself as reasonably smart, and I disagree. In fact, I think a blind faith in the idea that politicians would never use the terror threat for media manipulation purposes as quite naive.

It’s quite obvious the Easter ‘terrorist plot’ came about because

the government needed something dramatic to cover the death of Ian Tomlinson and the false postmortem report.

I believe the government didn’t have knowledge of any ongoing terrorist plots so they had to conjure one up. But they also had to take into account that there would be no evidence and after a few days they would have to release the men. So they would need an excuse for there being no evidence. That excuse would be that they had to take immediate action when Bob Quick revealed a secret document on terrorism to photographers. Apparently the typeface on the document was unusually large. So good old Bob sacrificed himself to protect a government that wants to beat up demonstrators and hide the fact that in trying out their new tactics they murdered one.

‘Start to think for yourself’

That’s exactly what I did. I suggest you do it too! Leave the shackles of your employers Jessy. You have been duped. You think you are any more than an expendable dogsbody to them?

Jess is the kind of stuff that leaks from the bottom after one too many curries.

Jess says their lives haven’t been ruined and then goes on debunk her own lies showing exactly why their lives WILL be ruined by the fact Jess assures us they were guilty just it wasn’t strong enough to stand up in court.

Jess you stink.

P.S. Eddie, caught Pilger’s latest column in THE NEW STATESMAN again?

Jess why do you waste so much of your time in a place that clearly disgusts you?

Is there some sort of visceral pleasure to be found in being a troll or have you run out of carpets to chew?

There’s a little thing called ‘innocent until proven guilty’ of which you seem to have no understanding. In the case outlined above there is NO EVIDENCE. That means that these people have not – in the eyes of the state – done anything. Therefore why should their education be curtailed while they suffer the indignity of deportation (which will almost undoubtedly have future influence on their ability to travel). Get some humanity, man, and join the real world where people don’t check under their beds for Bin Laden every night. Grow a pair and stop being so damned scared and disingenuous.

Thanks for some very interesting and informative pieces Craig. I have no doubt your blog will go from strength to strength.

From the days when the BBC used to produce meaning television,

The Power of Nightmares

The films compare the rise of the Neo-Conservative movement in the United States and the radical Islamist movement, making comparisons on their origins and claiming similarities between the two. More controversially, it argues that the threat of radical Islamism as a massive, sinister organised force of destruction, specifically in the form of al-Qaeda, is a myth perpetrated by politicians in many countries?”and particularly American Neo-Conservatives?”in an attempt to unite and inspire their people following the failure of earlier, more utopian ideologies.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2798679275960015727

strangely Adam Curtis (who made the PoN) believes the official story of 9-11, which always seemed at odds with the thrust of PoN.

If a rag-tag bunch of men from a cave could have caused such devastation to the US (and by lucky coincidence bring down WTC7 too – No plane yes, but NIST is rumoured to be coming out with a magic carpet theory soon!) then the implications for severe consequences of other terrorist actions should be much cause for concern too oui?

Pity Mr Curtis is so terribly wrong however. His other works make for great watching and thought, but his Kennedy/Bob McNamara bit on the Cuban missile crisis is pretty weak. But we do need more Adam Curtis’s

“That’s exactly what I did. I suggest you do it too!”

You’re spouting the typical Xfiles, Alex Jones, type conspiracy theory that lots of young people on the internet find it fun to do. You’re just following the herd. You’re dragging Craig’s name through the mud by doing this.

I always find Adam Curtis’ stuff to be interesting, but rather silly. The idea that the police and politicians can make up all of these plots, and get so many convictions, is absurd. As we saw from the Iraq war, the intelligence agencies leak like a seive. It would be impossible for so many people to make something up without it coming out. We all know this.

///We all know this///

Who is this “we”?

The “intelligent people”?

The “ignorant people”?

This fully paid stooge, is so bereft of any originality, that any seven year old net savvied child can discern the format of “its” posts, so common place around the various blogs; designed to give the impression of existence of automatons, hence validating the need for the almost infantile lies of the “media” that in the best traditions of the necons, and zionists find it necessary, to console the society; for our society needs “consolation” lies.

Fact that the standard template for deflection of the blame has been set around pointing the finger of blame at the spooks, whom can never come out and set the record straight, as well as the format using the media as in any “operation mockingbird” with a view to to appease the great unwashed, whilst ignoring the public record and “operation Gladio” (seeing as no one will ever google these) to push home the sacrifices of our great, and dear leaders, whose sole preoccupation is to serve and protect, just as they have instructed our “Police” to do so assiduously enough, as De Menezes, Tomlinson, and Dr. Kelly families would vouch.

All is well, so no police state, although must make sure that within the radius of one mile from the “parliament”, don’t talk out loud, and or have any unsanctioned literature on your person, and be prepared to enjoy the contraptions that have sprang up around the “people’s house” to protect it from the people, in case any foreign Guys, or is that Fawkes, are passing by?

Think of the juxtaposition as a sort of product placement. It’s been going on for decades.

BBC is british propaganda machinary-it always has been.

6th march,2007.

BBC comment(atleast her washingtons correspondent’s comments) on scooter LibBy’s gulity verdit on 6th march,2007–”it does not matter to white house as long as iraq war turns out to be all right”!! for BBc illegal occupation of iraq and killing of million civilians does not matter -it will be al r ight for american occupation. This is human rights and democracy ala BBc and british propaganda.

see and watch todays bbc and realize how much bbc and other british propaganda machinary is responsible for bush war crimes.

He also assuredly told that this “white house is quite safe”as wished for by the british ofocurse. during gore-bush florida tussle bbc was advocating gore to leave bush alone as britian was waiting for american missile defence to come her shore soon and so no delay in small matter of who should be presidentof usa be allowed.d-bit belicve it? look at all british propaganda between 1st novembr till 20th novembr of 2000.

it is high time that engish spies in american establishment be eliminated..

it is high time that these english spies in usa are taken care of .

also during and after the gulf war(first iraq war) the british were taking full creidit for insitagating bush 1 to start and persue war agasint iraq. the reason war criminal blair diidnto take full creidt for iraq war 2 was because that went sour(failure has no fathers claming thiers). itis a fact that merciless war done by america has benen perpetauted by the british agents inside america( and not some indepdnet israli agents as claimed-it jsut so happend that only know israli interest happend to coinside with those of english parasites -that is why war on and for behalf of england is being waged by america the world over.

By the way in IN ’88 when Dalai lama, at the height of Tibetan disturbances, visited west, the then british prime minister refused to meet Him. Later on with the demise of Russia and usefulness of China gone and with manipulation to keep power in Hong Kong somehow intact, the same british media and government ,like dog, started barking at China. It is interesting that amnesty international selectively targets those very countries( as it did china after cold war) who are out of favour (because they would not be a british stooge) of the british media and govt. This is not surprising as amnesty international is the creation of british govt, and british media. england with the most appalling record of human rights in last 200 years of her evil rule, needed some organisation to keep the others from charging england off her past and current evil practices. In other words it went for aggressive posture in propaganda war so that others can be demoralized and stopped from pointing out the real evil which is england. That is why amnesty international is one armour of the british lies to exploit the rest of the world. Amnesty international must be ignored and an independent human watchdog (which england will simply ignore) created. One purpose of amnesty international is to create an atmosphere for hatred towards the would be victims of british exploitation so that a victim could be blamed to have deserved the consequences. That is why ,now amnesty international sometimes threatens China, sometimes India and etc.

avatar singh,

If only we were that effective, what problems would we face now?

Try testing your theory with the evidence, rather than testing the evidence with your theory.

@ avatar singh.

You’ve got that a little bit mixed up mate. The US and UK have persistently favoured Israyhell in incremental steps (of course) since the early 20th century. Even to the extent where the US accepts attacks on its ships (etc etc) and covers it up to protect Israyhell. The UNSC is another good place to see things like this.

China is attacked by AI because of it’s fascist govt. AI bening a front for Israyhell via. the caucasian nations

(or at best slightly steered by a few plants within it) is irrelevant.

‘You’re spouting the typical Xfiles, Alex Jones, type conspiracy theory that lots of young people on the internet find it fun to do. You’re just following the herd. You’re dragging Craig’s name through the mud by doing this.’

Jessy, you win the argument. I will just close with your immortal words if I may:

Words borrowed from ‘The Jessy’:

‘Don’t believe what you read. Question everything!’

Cheers Jessy.

Craig – I thought you might like this. Pretty much stolen from your blog, but quite amusing nontheless.

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/war/very-big-terror-plot-not-very-big-or-terrifying-or-a-plot%2c-admit-police-200904221718/

Keep up the good work,

Sam.

bbc have to stop there propaganda when it come to the middleeast the uk and the usa are a joke. i wonder were these two evil states stand today on liberia as there position changes daily