Thank you, Craig – I had intended to watch it anyway but now there is even more reason.
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I wonder if you saw Glorious 39 by Stephen Poliakoff also with Nighy

Thanks for the reminder. I will watch it. It will be a nice change from the grotesque black propaganda coming out of the newsrooms at the moment.
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I also very much enjoyed The Hour, especially the final episode last week. A reminder that once there was investigative journalism on the BBC in the days of Grace Wyndham Goldie.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_Wyndham_Goldie

As-Salāmu `Alaykum
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Al-Quds
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OI9LzO-B8g

If the film is as good as what the poster suggests… !

I guess (and this is entirely noncommittal) it will be considerably above the average, not great (not of enduring value), but the actors will have done truly brilliant jobs (though somewhat in vain).

My intuition is probably more than a bit rubbish, last time I watched tv was nine years ago.

Its also in HD, and I have set my SKY+ thing to record it. As bizzare as it may seem, although I have SKY+ including HD, I hardly ever watch TV. The last time was the London Riots.

I read Murder in Samarkand in The Maldives whilst it was stormy in the first few days. I couldn’t stop turning the pages. I fully intended to turn up at the Houses of Parliament Craig Torture thing but Craig asked if someone could record it. I didn’t know how to do it, but found out in about an hour or so – the time I would otherwise be travelling into London. I had no time to test it – but it worked.

However, only 5,836 people have seen it in over 2 years

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LF9spgagSHI

Nothing has improved.

Want to see the latest video games?

Killing 2 year olds by Remote Control from an Office in RAF Waddington was it?

Or was that Tel aviv – or The Nevada Desert.

I must be evil in wanting the Hurricane to Do Its Worse.

I Can’t Deny It, even though it should be hitting London and Tel Aviv.

The Americans and The Israelis are Relatively Innocent Compared With US.

We come From England – Check Out Our History.

Tony

Good for you, Craig, I’m glad. Bravery motivated by passion and compassion: a long-lasting source of inspiration. Thank you, by the way.

Thank you for putting up those You Tubes Tony. I am one of the nearly 6000 viewers and saw the series. Depressing to see that the following six parts only record an audience of under 1,000 but I have heard that Google/You Tube doctor the figures on anything political that does not fit the agenda of the gangsters-in-charge.
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I remember the mainly cold dead eyes and hearts of that committee but remember with gratitude the humanity shown by the late Lord Onslow.
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You are correct in your analysis of the current situation btw.

That little bit of Bill Nighy that’s you? It’s the guy from Love Actually isn’t it? No, seriously, all good stuff. Have been gibbering to me ol’ dear about Karimov and Afghanistan and now Libya and Quadaffi whether it’s the CIA, mafia or MI6 who’s got him – may be the Itais or as Hague keeps blethering the Venezualans. He could do a Jimmy Hoffa and keep the pundits speculating. Place yer bets…

Mary,

I do lots of videos, some are sacrosanct

Like standing up, against all odds and nearly losing your life for it…

TORTURE Destroys The Entire Basis of Human Civilisation

I Personally Nominate Craig John Murray as a Saint For Having The Courage To Potentially Lose His Life TO STAND AGAINST IT

He Is One Honest Man Standing Against EVIL

Such Courage Is Wonderful

Tony

[Deleted, disruptive]

Why is this site so demonstrably pro-911 conspiracy buttery?

Apologies, I may have made a few spelling mistakes

What Do You Think All The Corparet Carpet Cretins Are Going To Do, When They Are Surrounded By Young Small Independent Businesses Staffed By The Talented Kids Friends’ who Deliver What They Promise on Time

And Build Works of Beauty That Will Last Way Beyond The Time You are Dead and What YOU Tried To Destroy

Go and Fuck Yourselves – You MONSTERS

Fuck Off and Die

Tony

Ah
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I see now
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The failure of
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Craig’s blog to handle
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carriage returns
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is a deliberate design feature
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to
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shorten
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topy_opmoc’s posts

So long as the politicians of the UK believe that Judaism is the underpinning foundation of Christianity and that the Zionist bankers in London and Washington are the manifestation of real power underlying our civilisation and our state, Palestine will be in occupation. The kettling of protesters outside the banks will be nothing to the boiling water that the defenders of Western Judaeo-Christian hegemony will be made to drink, Blair, Brown and Cameron. Unfortunately Craig is next on the list unless he sees the connection between Zionist Banking power and illegal state terror. Liberalism refuses to condemn destructive power that is obtained legally under British Law. Why bite off the heads of innocent children if you have a pit-bull terrier to do it for you instead? Palestine is the direct responsibility of UK governments because WE give the Zionist Bankers authority and WE give them a haven in our leafy villages. We should be making it very unsafe for Zionist bankers to exist freely in the West.

“Mousa inquiry ‘to clear Army of systematic abuse’”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14697170

Jon. There is absolutely no benefit whatsoever in torturing Muslims in order to obtain information, even though the government has admitted that it used information of this kind confident that it was obeying its own and international regulations. There is no security benefit and no economic benefit. The only benefit is to satisfy the racism, atheism and savage apartheid of the Zionists.
You are equally indefensible in camouflaging Zionist sadism as economic self-advantage, and equally stupid.

Jon, you are also completely misinformed when you assume that there is a connection between sincere practising Jews or Israeli citizens and Zionism. The Zionists embrace Cabbalistic magic from ancient Babylonian Iraq, sacrificial paganism they took from classical Greece, Demeter worship, totally fanatic apartheid which gives permission for Jews to do anything to anybody outside their sect.
It’s absolutely appalling that you can lump together a world-dominating evil group of satanistic gangsters who hold the world to ransom through their banking networks, and ordinary individuals who practise their faith, or live in a particular place.
God help us if this site is managed by people of such unfathomable ignorance. Can’t we move on a bit or grow up a bit.
Allow me to remove that grubby, sticky dummy of British values from your comfort-seeking pout.

Just finished watching it, fabulous..

An interesting reveal at the end of Page Eight exposing the cover up of an assassination by Shabak.
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A very enjoyable and thought provoking film. This review and that in the Guardian only gave it three stars out of five (why does everything have to have star ratings?) but I think it warrants top marks.
http://www.cultbox.co.uk/reviews/episodes/1689-page-eight-review
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I am always moved by the poetic words of I Vow To Thee My Country to the music of Holst. Patriotism has been stolen by the warmongers and killers.

Yeah, I liked the way Nighy walked off like the pink panther at the end. And, was I missing something, but did he just decide to forget about the whole torture thing because of the lovely girl who lived next to him with the kindly Dad or because he thought that the big secret about the Israelis was much worse than the Americans systematic secret use of torture? Not very Craig. You’ve got to hand it to those Israelis heh, they always know how to be the real bad guys. Shame though, I thought that the psycho guy from Schindler’s list was the obvious baddy.

Ah, those are the new rules for the new century. Just got it. Forget about our own systematic use of evidence from torture and stick it to the Israelis instead. One of the great moralists of out time is that David Hare. Really, I can’t stop laughing.

I noted the bit:
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A coroner has been involved
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What, a real coroner?

Time to mention Salahuddin Amin, the UK complicit torture case the UK government don’t want you to focus upon….

Yes, I agree with Dan J. A good drama. And it is drama, not documentary. But it makes mainstream assumptions. It is on the BBC, post-Kelly, after all:
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1) That the UK security services did not really know about the specific locations of the CIA’s black sites. Bullshit. They took part (to take part need not mean to be in the same room) in the interrogations, feeding the torturers with questions. These fucking Lear Jets landed on several UK airports – the Govt and SIS/SS were complicit.
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2) The romantic thing was unecessary and rather ‘Hollywood’. Why was there not als a dog?
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3) The two plots – black sites PM involved and Israel-Palestine did not really work well together. It smacked of easy sloganeering – even if I agree with those slogans. We needed something a little darker, really. Not just another glorified political soap opera. I’m being very harsh here – Devil’s Advocate. I enjoyed watching it.
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4) The Scottish character seemed miscast. Not really convincing to me anyway. His style was like something out of ‘River City’. The main characters, I should say, acted excellently.
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5) The UK was completely hand-in-glove with the USA in torture, black sites, etc.
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6) The SIS agreed to twist the evidence wrt Iraq. The idea of an honourable spy service is a joke.
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7) Why so many artist? God, everyone’s writing a fucking novel or painting or reading manuscripts. This is what happens when a writer spends too much time among artists and not enough time in real life. There should be a Golden Rule for creatie writing: Never write about artists. Well, not always, but you know what I mean. It reeks of ‘Here is a respctable drama with middle class people’.
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Nonetheless, thanks for the recommendation – it was good entertainment and made some important, if obvious, points. If it had com out in 2003/4/5, say, then fireworks. Now, uhm, smacks of lip servce.
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Oh sorry, another criticism. The ‘quaint little Indian family scene’ was straight of out 1965. I almost expected the granny to say: “Goodness gracious me, Mr Spy, how welcome you are here!” Jesus Johnny, are these the only roles Asian actors can get in the UK today? Answer: In my experince of having talked with loas of Asian British actors, largely, sadly, yes. It was gratuitous and typical. It really irritates. A little like having a ‘Whisky Galore’ scene to show that ‘now we are in Scotland, och aye!’
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I know that from pen to screen entails 50,000 people – but Hare also directed it.
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I’m being harsh because I liked it – does that makes sense? I’d have expcetd better in these ways. Well, at least the Arab Brits were goodies, for a change.
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It wouldn’t have been commissioned if it’d been properly harsh on the UK establishment. Now everyone can go to bed feeling some sort of catharsis.
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I think we need to ditch catharis, actually and go with Augusto Boal.

Ha!
Pre-war Iraq ‘not threat to UK’, former MI5 boss says
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http://members5.boardhost.com/medialens/msg/1314583302.html

Watched it through, rather agree with the more negative comments. Yes, I caught the throwaway line ‘a *real* coroner?’. Noted also, however, the strong endorsement of the idea that MI5 knew nothing about 7/7 – that will be shining bright, as my son says.
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Some good acting, especially the lady spy chief, but is it really plausible that the Johnny character, offered a choice between bringing down a corrupt PM and pleasing a pretty girl would choose the latter, when either choice means loss of career, pension and country? ‘I vow to thee my country’ (Holst hated it, by the way) was quickly ditched for a smile.
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“God, everyone’s writing a fucking novel or painting or reading manuscripts.”
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swyAN7j1R7E&feature=player_embedded

I did like the way in which the ‘journalist’ with the FT was seen still to be on a salary from MI5. And the ‘coroner’ comment, yes, that was on the head.
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What on earth was the role of the ‘Waitrose’ product placement poly bag.? Was it intended to be comedic? He’s carrying around wads of £60,000 in a see-thru’ poly bag, as though he were a junkie on the pavement? Is that an homage to some or other scene in the Pink Panther or some other classic? Who knows? But the witty allusions to 1960s spy dramas – in the end titles, etc. – was not that appropriate. 1960s spy flicks were all-round family entertainment, light, fantasy, comedic really. From the early 1970s, spy dramas got much harder, grittier, realism. This drama was more a ‘Day of the Jackal’, ‘Edge of Darkness’ kind of scenario, so these comedic bits seemed out of place, like a fond afterthought and if we’re saying, ‘This was all a bit of a joke’, then what was the point of it all? I liked the jazz, though. The driver finding a hard bop jazz station so quickly was bit of poetic license. You try finding such a station in the middle of the day!
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Key messages of this drama:
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1) The Old Boy Network is beneficent and avuncular. It’s just those Thatcherite harridans with hairstyle-to-match one needs to be wary of. ‘England’ (or ‘The United Kingdom’ is a beneficent enterprise poisoned by those nasty Yanks and a single villain, an ambitious PM.
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2) Some journalists work for the security services and some are actually paid agents.
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3) The security services may kill people/ have people killed and then get bent coroners to help cover it up.
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4) Love, Waitrose and wads of money conquer all.
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5) There’s that Mr Fiennes again! Oh, and that Mr Gambon!
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6) If you’re going to hire someone to play a Scottish/Welsh prodigy (?Gareth Williams lookalike), first make sure they are convincing in the role.
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7) Did the lead character have Parkinson’s Disease? I liked the stiff upper lip facies, actually, reminded me a little of George Smiley, very apt.
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Senior politicians get rewarded for lying. Indeed.
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9) Syrian women are good-looking.
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10) The ‘beautiful, dark, mysterious stranger next door’ (every heterosexual man’s fantasy) seemed similar to that in ‘Rubicon’, though obviously dramas are written way before they are produced.
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Interesting one. Thanks again for the recommendation.

Vronsky – Holst hated it. Are you sure? Nothing here.
Tune

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In 1921 Gustav Holst adapted the music from a section of Jupiter from his suite The Planets to create a setting for the poem. The music was extended slightly to fit the final two lines of the first verse. At the request of the publisher Curwen Holst made a version as a unison song with orchestra (Curwen also published Sir Hubert Parry’s unison song with orchestra, Jerusalem). This was probably first performed in 1921 and became a common element at Armistice memorial ceremonies, especially after it was published as a hymn in 1926.[1]Holst harmonised the tune to make it useable as a hymn, which was included in Songs of Praise[2] in 1926 with the same words, but the tune was then called Thaxted (named after the village where Holst lived for many years). The editor of the new (1926) edition of Songs of Praise was Holst’s close friend Ralph Vaughan Williams, which may have provided the stimulus for producing the hymn.
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Imogen Holst recorded that “At the time when he was asked to set these words to music, Holst was so over-worked and over-weary that he felt relieved to discover they ‘fitted’ the tune from Jupiter”.[3]
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I realize of course that the hymn was created to the background of the horror of the millions of bodies slain in WWI and was part of the ‘pro patria mori’ propaganda which is still being used today to good effect to recruit the killers.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Vow_to_Thee,_My_Country

“Holst hated it. Are you sure? Nothing here.”

Er – maybe I’m thinking of Elgar and ‘Land of Hope and Glory’, though I can’t find anything to support that vague memory either. Anyway, I hate them both – so very ‘Last Night of the Proms’ and all that emetic jingoism. Why don’t they just sing Horst Wessel and be done with it?

Re: The drama “Page Eight”.
The main theme was of course, torture of ‘terror suspects’ by the Americans and their Actors versus the UK Government’s foreknowledge/complicity of the same. In many ways, this has represented actual events, as revealed by victims and courageous whistleblowers such as Craig Murray himself.
“Page Eight”, is an easily digestable drama, le Carré it is not. For the viewer au fait with the History of the post 9/11 world, it revealed little and while reinforcing most of the Govenment lead memes.
In this, I cannot admit to surprise or disappointment, it was the BEEB after all.
The main message for the masses (sheep?) was that blame lay wholly with the Tony Blair esque character, Prime Minister Alec Beasley. Big boy done it and ran away.
A cheap although watchable pysop.

Yeah, apart from those occasional throwaway lines which were never dramatically followed-up, it shared the more or less same set of basic presumptions as, say, ‘Spooks’. The US spy drama, ‘Rubicon’ (which I would strongly recommend, btw) also penned by a respected playwright, actually pushed the boat out much further. Granted, that ‘Rubicon’ was a series, not a one-off. Nonetheless…

Wonderful Syrian kanun-player, Maya Youssef. Great music.

http://www.kanunplayer.com/

Dear Craig,

I watched the Page 8 thing with mounting anger because I was thinking of you and your story. Maybe I missed a lot of the subtlty in the piece because I know that David Hare is not an idiot. However, what is the f*cking point of piecing together another sexy HD-compatible spy thriller which rips off the known facts of your story to give Ms Weisz and Messers Gambon and Nighy another disposable thesp-fest? Christ. She does the beautiful hand-wringing and they do the remarkable British underplaying and NOTHING F*CKING CHANGES except they get EVEN RICHER and Hare gets another lot of plaudits from the broadsheets. He should write a play about being old and rich and yet still wanting to be young and radical but knowing that he isn’t. The piece honked from arsehole to breakfasttime.

His dramatisation of “Samarkand” had me weeping with impotent rage. That’s the f*cking story, not this bollox.

I am so sorry you didn’t get your honorary degree. Saying on your blog how it hurt you was noble and memorable. And inspiring and helpful, as you so often are. Bound to say, though, how can you not see what’s going on? Lorraine Kelly gets it and you don’t? Now why on earth might that be? Christ almighty, you must be a real c*nt Craig.

Martin, a powerful piece – hits the nail on the head. You didn’t miss any subtly; there wasn’t any.

I watched it on Iplayer yesterday and the similarities struck me from the moment niceties were exchanged over the long table.

My missis loves Bill Nye and his sleazy sloping self, I can only agree, he’s got a certain swagger.
Has David Hare had its inspirations from murder in samarkand, did your story put him on to it? its does certainly look like it.

What I liked about this film was the ways in which the government expressed its views, and to some extent how it came to them. First of all the Jacquie Smith clone (is that fair?) didn’t even bother to read the document properly and had missed the fairly obvious statement which proved our knowledge. Secondly the hate figure, the woman who kept trashing Nighy, telling him he was going to have to live out of dusbins, she expressed the passionate delusion which seemed to drive the Blairites – certainly Straw – that they couldn’t afford to go against the yanks. I agree with some of Suhayl’s points, but to some extent this drama helped me understand something which has often puzzled me – how could the govt be so stupid?
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The compromise which Nighy made – a massive one – that he was going to save his girlfriend’s brother’s rep and give up his campaign against the govt, is, according to Craig’s book although rather wet, the kind of compromise a lot of people in govt seem to make, save their friend and to hell with the main game.

Nebuchadnezzar, thaks. Yes, I think the Home Secretary character may have been a composite of Jacqui Smith and Hazel Blears.
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“that they couldn’t afford to go against the yanks” Nebuchadnezzar.
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Well, of course the UK has had that dynamic since 1956 (this ois what the ‘Special Relationship’ means; it is a little that that b/w a paedophile and his ‘Lolita’), but more intensely so under/since the Blair premiership. Truth is, most of the ‘New Labour’ kingpins were de facto US agents of influence in the UK, often ‘seeded’ products of a very deliberate strategy on the part of the USA. They sold their souls a long time ago and they became fervent evangelists for the cause of global capital and the military might which enforces its hegemony throughout the world. These seeds all look slightly different and bring forth flowers of variegated colour into the Hanging Gardens. But they all come, not from the field, but from the same, well-ordered garden centre.
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Btw, how is life in Babylon these days? (!)

‘most of the ‘New Labour’ kingpins were de facto US agents of influence in the UK, often ‘seeded’ products of a very deliberate strategy on the part of the USA.
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See how many of them are chosen to be Fulbright scholars.

The Independent gave room to this Hasbara type effort on Tuesday in its letters column.
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Naturally, the Israeli army is the baddie
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David Hare is one of the country’s most talented playwrights. It was a pity therefore to see his latest BBC work, Page 8, exemplifies the most simplistic nostrums. The old man gets the young beautiful woman and Israel and her army act as the lurking background evil.
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The fashionable use of Israel and her army as the easy fall-back baddie is lazy and boring, and displays a wilful avoidance of the violence, corruption and oppression so common in many countries. That the heroine is the daughter of a well-meaning Syrian activist fighting for justice against Israeli aggression would be laughable if it wasn’t so tragic, while so many Syrians are being slaughtered by their own leaders.
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Joe Wolfson

Borehamwood, Hertfordshire

Exactly, Mary (wrt the US scholarships) – Denis Lehane’s story is instructive wrt the Harkness Fellowships too. I’d strongly recommend his book to everyone – it’s a cracking read.
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http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/products/denis+lehane/philip+knightley/unperson/6759663/

Educative as ever Suhayl. I had not heard of Harkness and as for poor Denis Lehane -
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Synopsis
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Denis Lehane is an Irish award-winning journalist. In 1984, he refused to work undercover for the CIA and MI5 who, in revenge, spread rumours that he was insane, an alcoholic and a serial rapist who had tried to murder his two girlfriends. Certified insane in London and later in Dublin, he was put away in an asylum for life.
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Some of those smear tactics are familiar to us on this blog.