Amelia Hill is a Dirty Liar

by craig on January 30, 2013 3:47 pm in Uncategorized

The Guardian hit a new low in Amelia Hill’s report on Julian Assange’s appearance at the Oxford Union. Hill moved beyond propaganda to downright lies.

This is easy to show. Read through Hill’s “report”. Then zip to 20 minutes and 55 seconds of the recording of Assange speaking at the event Hill misreports, and simply listen to the applause from the Oxford Union after Assange stops speaking.

Just that hearty applause is sufficient to show that the entire thrust and argument of Amelia Hill’s article moves beyong distortion or misreprentation – in themselves dreadful sins in a journalist – and into the field of outright lies. Her entire piece is intended to give the impression that the event was a failure and the audience were hostile to Assange. That is completely untrue.

Much of what Hill wrote is not journalism at all. What does this actually mean?

“His critics were reasoned, those who queued for over an hour in the snow to hear him speak were thoughtful. It was Julian Assange – the man at the centre of controversy – who refused to be gracious.”

Hill manages to quote five full sentences of the organiser of the anti-Assange demonstration (which I counted at 37 people) while giving us not one single sentence of Assange’s twenty minute address. Nor a single sentence of Tom Fingar, the senior US security official who was receiving the Sam Adams award. Even more remarkably, all three students Hill could find to interview were hostile to Assange. In a hall of 450 students who applauded Assange enthusiastically and many of whom crowded round to shake my hand after the event, Hill was apparently unable to find a single person who did not share the Rusbridger line on Julian Assange.

Hill is not a journalist – she is a pathetic grovelling lickspittle who should be deeply, deeply ashamed.

Here is the answer to the question about cyber-terrorism of which Amelia Hill writes:

“A question about cyber-terrorism was greeted with verbose warmth”

As you can see, Assange’s answer is serious, detailed, thoughtful and not patronising to the student. Hill’s characterisation – again without giving a word of Assange’s actual answer – is not one that could genuinely be maintained. Can anybody – and I mean this as a real question – can anybody look at that answer and believe that “Verbose warmth” is a fair and reasonable way to communicate what had been said to an audience who had not seen it? Or is it just an appalling piece of hostile propaganda by Hill?

The night before Assange’s contribution at the union, John Bolton had been there as guest speaker. John Bolton is a war criminal whose actions deliberately and directly contributed to the launching of an illegal war which killed hundreds of thousands of people. Yet there had not been one single Oxford student picketing the hosting of John Bolton, and Amelia Hill did not turn up to vilify him. My main contribution to the Sam Adams event was to point to this as an example of the way people are manipulated by the mainstream media into adopting seriously warped moral values.

Amelia Hill is one of the warpers, the distorters of reality. The Guardian calls her a “Special Investigative Correspondent.” She is actually a degraded purveyor of lies on behalf of the establishment. Sickening.

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1,172 Comments

  1. resident dissident

    3 Feb, 2013 - 10:09 pm

    Nevermind
    As to how the Swedish legal system works, sorry, but I will place more reliance on the views of David Allen Green and the other blogs to which he links here:

    http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/david-allen-green/2012/08/five-legal-myths-about-assange-extradition

    I’ve read the comments which raise many of the objections raised here and some that have been not – so I see little benefit in rehashing the debate for my benefit.

    As for Iceland – perhaps i would suggest a little caution before placing too much faith in a country that was in the past in effect hijacked by a bubble of money largely supplied by Russian money launderers.

  2. Thanks Ben – yes I should have made that clearer.

  3. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    3 Feb, 2013 - 10:20 pm

    Mark; No worries. Why is it, the children are the first order of suffering and abuse? (rhetorical question alert)

    Thank you for your relentless concern for the most innocent amongst us.

  4. Resident Dissident, 8.55pm

    “My beef is that it wasn’t directly relevant to the argument I was having with N in which you intervened – which was about what the Swedes view of their won country was and the source of my own views on that matter.”

    Interesting that you should say that because, if I’m keeping track of the conversation correctly, N’s comments about Sweden were in fact a response to your earlier 12.10pm post beginning with the remark which you clearly intended to be provocative: “Perhaps Assange should join the SWP and then the comrades in true Leninist tradition could clear him of rape”

    http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2013/01/amelia-hill-is-a-dirty-liar/comment-page-2/#comment-391845

    Which means, I think, your 8.55pm counts as a No 20, yes?

    http://cryptome.org/2012/07/gent-forum-spies.htm

    Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation: The Gentleperson’s Guide To Forum Spies

  5. Resident Dissident, 10.09pm

    “As to how the Swedish legal system works, sorry, but I will place more reliance on the views of David Allen Green and the other blogs to which he links”

    We call him DAG around here, which suits him much better cf. the definition given at No 4 here:

    http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=dag

    “DAG: noun 1a. (usually in the plural) a lump of matted wool and faeces hanging from the rear end of a sheep; b. such a lump cut from a sheep. 2. a person (primarily male) who is regarded as something of a ‘character’, eccentric but entertainingly so, a wag. 3a. an unfashionable adolescent. b. any unfashionable or non-stylish person.”

    His theories about Legal Myths of the Assange case don’t cut much ice either:

    http://pastehtml.com/view/c91yw7wjy.html – scroll down to find:

    (READER CORRECTION OF) Legal myths about the Assange extradition

  6. resident dissident

    3 Feb, 2013 - 10:45 pm

    Arbed

    Not being disingenuous – why and when did I refer to Andrew Brown and to which of my posts were you clearly responding?

    yep no. 20 – false or more accurately irrelvant evidence on your part I’m afraid.

    No problem with my original comments being provocative – they were intended to be – but I wasn’t taliking then about whether or not Sweden was “owned” by the Wallenbergs. As you will see from my last post I have already formed my views as why Assange should face trial in Sweden and made clear on what they are based. I don’t believe whether or not Andrew Brown/Guardian has an axe to grind against Assange, which they probably do imho, really is of much relevance to that argument.

    I think we have reached the end of any meaningful discussion?

  7. resident dissident

    3 Feb, 2013 - 10:59 pm

    Arbed

    If you think the linked article on David Green’s NS article adds anything – apart from an assault on the English language, to the comments in the original article or those to which he links you are sadly mistaken. I very much doubt there is a genuinely new argument of any substance to be found. As for the ad hominem on David Green – classy!

    Cheerio!

  8. ‘There is a drone with Assange’s name on it’ – William Blum

    http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_01_28/There-is-a-drone-with-Assange-s-name-on-William-Blum/

  9. The Met stole the identities of dead children to use for undercover police work. The parents were not told.

    Police spies stole identities of dead children

    Exclusive: Undercover officers created aliases based on details found in birth and death records, Guardian investigation reveals

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/feb/03/police-spies-identities-dead-children

    Where the law ends, tyranny begins. John Locke (1632–1704)

  10. Resident Dissident, 10.45pm

    Which of your posts did I first reply to? It was this one:

    http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2013/01/amelia-hill-is-a-dirty-liar/comment-page-2/#comment-391852

    “N = not only do I know a few Swedes but I have also read Fishing in Utopia by Andrew Brown (about his experience of living in Swededn for a number of years) which received an Orwell Prize a few years backs – so with all due respects what you are talking about is garbage.”

    As I explained earlier, I was aware that Andrew Brown is the Guardian’s religious correspondent based in Sweden and, due to his associations with the Swedish Democrats Christian Brotherhood, he’s likely to personally know one, if not both, of the two women who lodged a police complaint against Assange. Not that he bothered to do anything as silly as full disclosure in that first smear piece he wrote for the Guardian on 17 December 2010:

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/andrewbrown/2010/dec/17/wikileaks-israel-shamir-russia-scandinavia

    Oddly enough, on a page of Craig’s blog dealing specifically with the Guardian’s continuous smears against Assange, I thought that might be relevant.

    By the way, did you know that DAG (sorry, David Allen Green) had already made up his mind that Assange was “running a cult” as early as 24 August 2010, only four days after the women went to the police?

    http://jackofkent.blogspot.co.uk/2010/08/wikileaks-cult.html

    Check the comments beneath DAG’s amazing bout of clairvoyance here, every single one of them disagrees with him. He’s hung on grimly to his views ever since, hasn’t he? – even if he has to tell whoppers and ignore large chunks of facts.

    Yes, I think we’re done now.

  11. Brits talk about the weather whether they are lying or not. We talk about the weather in order to buy time for thought.

    I confess, I have recently detected in my own feelings a slight thrill at the thought of the cavalry sweeping down the mountain in the form of the US finding an excuse to bomb Assad in Syria or the French removing Islamists in North Africa.

    Have I succumbed to the Zio-Bollywood we call World News? Time to talk about the weather while I question my intelligence.
    Look at the facts. We have a Black US president being used to re-colonise Africa, a boring French administrator distributing colonial style justice between warring tribes, a British Prime Minister pretending to be the insurance Churchill bulldog with a spring for a brain. We have CIA funded terrorists preparing the ground for Western intervention and creation of new Western influence in ex-colonial places like Africa and Syria. They only manage to lull us into a false sense of security with echoes of past certainties because we are all tasting dire economic uncertainties ourselves.

    Ergo, the purpose of the recession is firstly to increase bank lending and secondly to create a new world order while we are looking the other way. That new world order is not going a British, protestant, free world order, as we Brits like to imagine our now-expired empire used to be, but a violent, medieval, subservient world order controlled by mad US/Zionist bankers and policed by an IT based Shari’ah Inquisition, as our media like to portray the future to be.

    In other words an apartheid in which all traces of freedom of thought, like all traces of black DNA, will be counted as second-class non-citizens. No wonder we cling to the cowboy movie fantasies created for our entertainment in the Bollywood world news.

    By contrast, all thinking people should be with the uprising against the Arab dictators and with the Muslim groups in North Africa who are challenging the status-quo of global neo-colonialism.

    Does anyone else experience this wavering of allegiances between Western, nostalgic illusions of security and the Green shoots of an Islamic system which appears to be nurtured by Zionist megalomania , is it just me?

  12. “Swedish prosecutor caught lying again”.

    And the annoying thing is that those opposing Assange keep repeating as fact that it wouldn’t be possible to interrogate him here even though it’s been proved false. They carry on repeating it as if it were true and it’s become a sort of Zombie Fact.

  13. “Ecuador to take legal action over Assange extradition” 27.01.13

    “Ecuador will seek judicial help to ensure the safe passage from Britain of WiliLeaks founder Julian Assange.”

    http://www.euronews.com/2013/01/27/ecuador-to-take-legal-action-over-assange-extradition/

  14. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    3 Feb, 2013 - 11:59 pm

    Mary’s comment about the LAW made me reflect, but first, a question; Is the LAW sacrosanct, when it has been promulgated in the mire of our present day politics and the public gerrymandering which powered them into the category of Lawmakers? So who are WE to pick and choose those Laws worthy of respect? Sorry, that was two questions, but I am anathema to editing, as my bean-counting editors would have said, in another life.

    William Roper: So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!

    Sir Thomas More: Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?

    William Roper: Yes, I’d cut down every law in England to do that!

    Sir Thomas More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned ’round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man’s laws, not God’s! And if you cut them down, and you’re just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!

    ————————-

    So, I muddy the waters. More makes a distinction here, however. His principled stand, whether your respect Catholicism, or not, is the crux. He, in the true Christian ideal of Saint, in the sense that he martyred himself. Knowing full well the consequences, in the short-term, he chose the long-term. Whether or not his ideal was attained, misses the point. Principles are essential to us, whether we wish to recognize that fact, or not. But if you should choose to believe that he will enjoy the fulfillment of the promise, my guess is that More, regardless of the corrupt nature of his Doctrinal rectitude to the Vatican, will stand with other saints of known, or unknown origins. That is; if the God of the Bible is truly a God of Justice.

    The point of it all is thusly; I am not promoting that belief. What I am saying, and i think Mark and I are alike on this point, is that intent or ‘intention’ is all that matters. It is what cuts a swath of us through the path of life. More, in my estimation, had perfect ‘intent’ and even if he receives no award for meritorious behavior, we can retain more of ourselves from the valor and ‘saintliness’ of folks like him, by taking courage from his impeccable death.

    I know it’s early, by Pacific time, but I have the perfect excuse for imbibing early in the day. SuperBowl. It’s bullshite, but what the hell?

  15. David at 11.23, thanks for that Newspaper report. Marianne Ny (pronounced Knee) is the most odious of women. The corrupt UK legal establishment sat Lord Justice Phillips to find in favour of this tool of the Swedish establishment just before he retired to preside over the judiciary of Qatar – that great paragon of democratic rights. Can you imagine a UK prosecutor saying anything like he or she would not change their opinion even if they knew themselves to be wrong? I should hope not.

    “In an opinion piece published last Sunday in Sweden’s largest daily Dagens Nyheter, two Swedish journalists claimed that Marianne Ny had privately stated that she would not change her position on Assange even if she were wrong.

    Today, two years after Assange was first questioned by Swedish police in Stockholm, it seems increasingly clear that the reason why he has not been interviewed again has very much to do with prestige and little to do with law.”

    The article was published on 21 Aug 2012.

    And there are other professors in Sweden as well as Ove Bring who are convinced there was never a case for Julian Assange to answer.

  16. “Ecuador will seek judicial help to ensure the safe passage from Britain of WiliLeaks founder Julian Assange.”

    I wonder why Equador doesn’t give him a job, along with a diplomatic passport. I doubt the government would try to arrest him then, they would get all the diplomats they let go thrown back at them. He could shoot a police woman and get away with it.

  17. LastBlueBell

    4 Feb, 2013 - 12:12 am

    @Resident Dissident

    For your information, the Swedish judicial system is currently under rapidly increasing scrutiny after a string of dramatic high profile failures spanning the last 10 years.

    What is becoming increasingly clear is that these failures are not unfortunate accidents, but just the tip of the iceberg, and the results of deep systemic flaws.

    The scale and forms of these flaws, are to many Swedes, and in relation to historic norms almost breathtaking, and never in our modern history has the trust in the judicial system been so low as it is right now. Just over the last year alone, the trust in the judical system fell in the range of 40% (if I remember correctly), which is completly unprecedented.

    According to the offical statistics from 2011, only 52% of Swedes have high confidence in the courts, 51% in the prosecutors and only 41% in the correctional system. (NTU, Report 2012:2, “Om utsatthet, trygghet och förtroende”, Bra) These are also significantly lower then historic values.

    Sweden also uses politically nominated lay judges, and in a big survey of all Court of Appeal Managers in Sweden published in June 2012 in Swedens biggest morning newspaper, SVD, 6 of 10 strongly critize this system, and want it abolished. Particularly damning is the opinion, that they view the current system as legally unsafe, and that the lay judges express a political ideology in their application of the law

    In 2009 the former Chancellor of Justice, Göran Lambertz, published an investigation named “Wrongfully convicted”, that exposed serious shortcomings within the Swedish legal systems, that among many other thing found

    * Manipulation of evidence, and verdicts based on inconclusive evidence
    * Partial prosecutors
    * The courts overlooking outright failures in the underlying investigations.
    * Insufficient examination of the plaintiffs stories

    In 11 cases studied, which had lead to convictions and later appeals and acquittal, 8 were related to sexual offenses.

    He was efter this quietly removed from office…

    A summary of the Report and more details can be found here,
    http://www.dagensjuridik.se/2009/11/lambertz-rattssakerhet-ar-inte-nagot-man-blir-sarskilt-popular-pa

    And just some articles from the last weeks,

    Flaws in the justice systems must not be ignored, 16 Jan 2013, SVD
    http://www.svd.se/opinion/brannpunkt/rattssystemets-brister-ska-inte-viftas-undan_7827890.svd

    It must be easier to request a new trial after new evidence emerge, 9 Jan 2013,
    http://www.svd.se/opinion/brannpunkt/oka-mojligheten-att-fa-resning_7807860.svd

    The collaps of the trial in Södetälje is not unique, 10 Okt 2012, (By Professor Cleas Sandgren, representative to International Commission of Jurists)
    http://www.dn.se/debatt/haveriet-med-rattegangen-i-sodertalje-ar-inte-unikt

    It is also noteworthy that almost all the open critique of the justice system comes from people ouside the judicial and political system, like Prof Sandgren, or from retired Judges, like Brita Sundberg-Weitman or chief prosecutors like Sven Erik Alhelm, not from within.

    And on a personal reflection, I would be very careful trusting David Allen Green in regard to Swedish Law and Julian Assange.

  18. Clark,

    http://mitei.mit.edu/publications/reports-studies/future-nuclear-fuel-cycle

    Meant to post that link to you some time ago. Download the full PDF at link. Think you will find it interesting if you haven’t seen it before.

  19. Hello LastBlueBell, nice to see you again. Have you had a chance to do a quick revisit to the long Why I’m Convinced Anna Ardin is a Liar thread?

    http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/09/why-i-am-convinced-that-anna-ardin-is-a-liar/comment-page-6/#comments

    It’s reached six pages now, and I think there might be some new stuff on the last couple of pages which might interest Flashback.

  20. Oxford Union owns up it censored out the background video of Collateral Murder behind Assange during his speech at the Sam Adams awards on “legal advice”:

    http://www.cherwell.org/news/world/2013/02/03/wikileaks-accuses-union-of-quotcensorshipquot

    “In a statement to Cherwell, the Oxford Union said, “After taking extensive legal advice on this matter, the Union was advised not to display the background video in question for copyright reasons.”

    WikiLeaks said they themselves had “advised” the Union by asserting that “by law and practice the US government does not claim copyrights on footage or documents that it produces”.

  21. Really disgusting how the sick stalker is targetting Mary.

    You’re a sinister poster Habbabkuk,

    Sinister and ugly.

  22. Here’s a weird thing.

    I dont have a homophobic bone in me but i’d love the gay marriage shite to come unstuck simply to fuck the Govt up.

    Sorry but there it is.

    Does that make me a Nazi now?

  23. WHERE IS WERRITY?!

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2273022/Liam-Fox-return-Cabinet-help-stop-plots-Cameron.html

    The headline says it all, apols for Heil link. Will Werrity be making the come-back we’ve all been secretly pining for?

    Lordy but this Government is bent. It’s not even especially subtle.

  24. How many humans have you shredded and burned today Monsieur Hollande?

    Thirty jets targeted Islamist militants’ training and communication centres around Tessalit – a mountainous area near the Algerian border.

    French President Francois Hollande has pledged to help rebuild Mali after the rebels who seized its north are beaten.

    Kidal assault: French jets bomb northern Mali
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-21314779

  25. I should have said:

    Thirty French jets bombed Kidal yesterday. Imagine the scream of the jets followed by the screams of the victims. The bombing must have been indiscriminate.

    How many humans did you have you shredded and burned yesterday Monsieur Hollande?

    Thirty jets targeted Islamist militants’ training and communication centres around Tessalit – a mountainous area near the Algerian border.

    French President Francois Hollande has pledged to help rebuild Mali after the rebels who seized its north are beaten.

    Kidal assault: French jets bomb northern Mali
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-21314779

    ~~~
    This is/was Kidal
    http://maliwar.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/kidal.jpg
    Population of Kidal: 11 642 people
    http://www.tiptopglobe.com/big-photo/mali-2.jpg

  26. Roderick Russell who sometimes posts here writes -

    [..]
    Recently some of the Guardian’s readers have voiced their surprise at its hostile attitude on so many of the issues that they believe a truly “liberal” paper should actually be supportive of – For example, the Guardian’s extraordinarily negative reporting on Wikileaks just says it all.

    We wondered if our experiences might help explain some of the contradictions between what so many readers expect from the Guardian, and what is actually being delivered. Of course it’s well known that in the UK there is collusion between the mainstream media in general and power. But, our personal experiences with the Guardian also suggest another answer – the Guardian is too close to British intelligence.
    [..]

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/28/1182880/-The-Guardian-in-America-Icon-of-the-left-or-too-close-to-British-Intelligence

  27. Hat tip to Scrabble on Medialens for this.

    ’5 Broken Cameras

    New Wave Films have offered us a special discount on the DVD of the Oscar nominated documentary 5 Broken Cameras, a Palestinian farmer’s chronicle of his nonviolent resistance to the actions of the Israeli army in Bi’lin.

    At the check-out enter the special promotional code 5BC and the DVD price will be reduced from £10 to £7.

    Offer ends 28th February. Free P&P for UK customers.

    http://www.vivaverve.com/product.php/219/2/5_broken_cameras

    I also recommend this very moving film which I saw at the Palestinian Film Festival at the Barbican a few years back. It is on VivaVerve’s list.

    ‘The Time That Remains is a semi-autobiographical film, in four episodes, about a family, my family, from 1948 until recent times.

    The film is inspired by my father’s private diaries, starting from when he was a resistance fighter in 1948, and by my mother’s letters to family members who were forced to leave the country.

    Combined with my intimate memories of them and with them, the film attempts to portray the daily life of those Palestinians who remained and were labelled “Israeli-Arabs”, living as a minority in their own homeland.’ Elia Suleiman

    The film is at once a heart-breaking testament to his family, a lesson from history, and a poignant, subversively funny delight.

    http://www.vivaverve.com/product.php/110/9/the_time_that_remains

  28. Guano.
    The haves and the have nots, what we are told is what we must have and we are also told what we must not do.

    Yet we are constantly bombarded with thr Daily de-sanitizing news with depictions of wrong doing and violence.

    We have here some issues on the make up of society and the liberals cannot see that we need coaching, cajoling into beings that pretense into a modern society with values.

    Look up the word grace and tell me if that is not what we are missing.

  29. Probably Craig will have read the book, and listened in, but in case he might have missed it, last weeks Radio 4 Book at Bedtime was Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan by William Dalrymple, about the first Afghan War (1839-), a bit of a comedy of errors. That unfortunate Burnes chap gets a mention or three and without wanting to spoil the plot, he comes a cropper.

  30. Jives at 01h14 :

    ” I don’t have a homophobic bone in my body but I’d love the gay marriage shite to come instuck simply to fuck the Govt. up”

    I’m sure that the gays and lesbians would agree with you.

    Your post reveals the degree of unreasoned hate shown by some of you.

    You, Jives, are a truly stupid person. This blog would be better pace without the likes of you.

  31. Doug Scorgie wrote at 17h43 on 3 February ;

    “I have no doubt that Assad and his military have committed crimes but I doubt they amount to more than those committed by the rebels and the western false-flag attacks on civilian targets”

    I’m sure Doug would wish to add to the balance sheet the various human rights crimes carried out by Assad the Father and Assad the Son over the period of rule of the family firm.

    “They should all of course be held to account”

    At last! Thank you and well done, Resident Dissident, for obtaining this admission! He took his time making it.

    ********

    PS to Resident Dissident : be careful, boyo. You’ve already been called a troll, a turd and a Forum Spy. Before long they’ll be calling you a Habbabkuk!

  32. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 9:37 am

    “Niger has confirmed that French special forces are protecting one of the country’s biggest uranium mines.

    “French company Areva plays a major part in mining in Niger – the world’s fifth-largest producer of uranium.

    “Areva gets much of its uranium from the two mines it operates in the country, at Arlit and Imouraren.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-21318043

  33. LastBlueBell, thanks for those fascinating facts. It is hard for us non-Swedish speakers to get details about the general public’s faith in the Swedish political and judicial system. We know there are shady goings on. Anything that has the expertise of Karl Rove backing it is hardly likely to be a paragon of honesty and openness.

    Brendan, thanks for the Fox comeback link. Have you noticed how slyly the Atlantic Bridge schoolmates are re-assembling at the top. Chris Grayling, with no legal background, is our new Justice Secretary.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2012/sep/04/chris-grayling-justice-secretary-non-lawyer

    And now Fox. You cannot get more sly than Fox.

  34. Doug Scorgie, thanks for the Nigerian link to France’s control of uranium in Nigeria through the Areva company. Although we have not heard anything about it on MSM the alternative press is convinced that uranium is the real reason for France’s intrusion into Mali. Again Areva is at the forefront.

    http://newsjunkiepost.com/2013/01/14/mali-frances-neo-colonial-war-for-uranium/

    As far as I can see there is one politician speaking out against Areva. Laurent Louis is a member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives and a great credit to his electorate.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkzXTgslFNE&feature=player_embedded#

  35. Look, I bouught this chocolate chip muffin but didn’t feel like eating it while we were talking; would you like to share it?

  36. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 10:45 am

    BBC misleading again:

    “All organised opposition is banned in Cuba and all candidates for elections have been selected by the ruling Communist Party or its affiliated associations.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-21318208

    To deconstruct this:
    “All organised opposition is banned in Cuba…”

    Cuba does not have a multi-party system. No political organisation is allowed to campaign (Not even the state communist party).

    “…all candidates for elections have been selected by the ruling Communist Party or its affiliated associations.”

    Any Cuban over 16 can put themselves forward to be elected by the local constituents; they are not selected in advance by the communist party or anyone else.

    Elections in Cuba have two phases:
    1. election of delegates to the Municipal Assembly, and
    2. election of deputies to the Provincial and National Assemblies.
    Candidates for municipal assemblies are nominated on an individual basis at local levels by the local population at nomination assemblies.[6]
    Candidates for provincial assemblies and the National Assembly are nominated by the municipal assemblies from lists compiled by national, provincial and municipal candidacy commissions.[6]

    Anyone older than 16 other than those mentally incapacitated, imprisoned, or deprived of their political rights can vote and be nominated to these posts.[6]

    Municipal candidates must be at least 16 years old.[6] No political parties (including the Communist Party of Cuba) are permitted to campaign. All elections take place by secret ballot.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_Cuba#Electoral_system

    This is not a political system I support but it is at least a type of democracy and not a dictatorship as the western main stream media portray ad infinitum.

  37. It just occurred to me : we have seen Assad the Father, we are now experiencing Assad the Son….and Allah willing, we might soon welcome Assad the Unholy Ghost.

    By bye Bashir!

  38. “As far as I can see there is one politician speaking out against Areva.Laurent Louis is a member of the Begian Chamber of Representatives AND A GREAT CREDIT TO HIS ELECTORATE” (emphasis added)

    Ah, John Goss, the perils of posting from a position of insufficient knowledge!

    Note the followng from the Belgian Wikipedia (my translation) :

    “…he decided in February 2010 to leave the Mouvement reformateur (nb – this is an established Belgian political party) and join the People’s Party which had been formed three months previously.
    At the general election of June 2010 he only obtained 1345 preference votes. He was nevertheless elected thanks to the “apparentement” mechanism (nb – this is a peculiar feature of the Belgian electoral system) which worked to the detriment of the CDH (nb – this is another established Belgian political party)and so became the first deputy of the People’s Party to sit in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives.
    In February 2011, Laurent Louis formed the Mouvement libéral démocrate and became its president…”

    And, by the way, in January 2013 he dissolved the party he’d formed just inder a year previously.

    So much for his magnificent electorate (all 1345 preference votes)!

  39. Mary
    Obviously those jets would not be targetting friendly paid-up Al-CIAda people. They would be targetting the people who were victims of Al-CIAda violence but still refused to shout ‘vive la France’ at the arrival of the neo-colonials. i.e. the people who have opinions of their own. You are right to extend your sympathy to them as this will help to continue their cause in spite of being spat on by Al CIAda and shot up by French Liberte.

  40. Maybe that should read ‘cut up’ by Al-CIAda

  41. Well done, John Goss. You’re in good company. Max Keiser has noticed this young man, Laurent Louis too.

    As you know, Max knows hoe the system works from the inside.

    http://maxkeiser.com/2013/01/27/belgian-mp-laurent-louis-drops-the-f-bomb-in-parliament-about-the-neo-colonial-adventures-for-which-media-provides-propaganda-cover/

    The comments below are very supportive as well.

    Look at the old complacent farts behind him as he speaks. He’s very much a voice of his generation.

    Remember Patrice Lumumba, first legally elected Prime Minister of the Congo, murdered by the West and replaced by a savage dictator.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrice_Lumumba

    The Belgian Congo, as was, was probably the most vicious example of Western colonial brutality, all for their immense resources. It inspired a British consul Sir Roger Casement to support Republicanism in Ireland and was also the inspiration for Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

  42. John Goss
    ‘You cannot get more sly than Fox.’

    What about Geoff Hoon?

  43. Hunhe pleads guilty and resigns as MP. Pity he strung it out for so long. He has involved the state in large legal costs.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/liberaldemocrats/9847152/Chris-Huhne-quits-as-he-faces-jail-after-pleading-guilty-to-perverting-course-of-justice.html

  44. Huhne.

  45. Was looking for that video of Hoon attempting to sell himself to an undercover lobbying form, and came across this old fart on the make:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5i1b_v9NxU

  46. Two Hoons

  47. Doesn’t take them long to go for each other’s throats.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/liberaldemocrats/9847054/Chris-Huhne-Tories-seek-revenge-in-Eastleigh-by-election.html

    Coalition? What a farce. They are ALL opportunists.

  48. “Ah, John Goss, the perils of posting from a position of insufficient knowledge!”

    Habbakuk, I bow to your superlative skills in this respect.

  49. I have always called him Buff-Hoon David. This is a very short extract of his Cab for Hire episode.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/video/2010/mar/24/politicians-for-hire-dispatches

  50. guano, I enjoyed your comment of 3 Feb, 11:39 pm. When problems are complex, the human mind has a regrettable tendency to simplify; often this takes the form of choosing one “side” or the other. The corporate media exploits this; I expect that this is partly propaganda, partly just whipping up emotional reactions to boost readership, and partly that media employees themselves suffer from the same urge to simplify and polarise. So to answer your question:

    “Does anyone else experience this wavering of allegiances between Western, nostalgic illusions of security and the Green shoots of an Islamic system which appears to be nurtured by Zionist megalomania , is it just me?”

    I sometimes feel myself “wavering”, too, though not between the poles that you specify, and when I do, I remind myself that my knowledge is probably inadequate. As to supporting one group or another, we all come with a conscience built-in, whereas which faiths we get exposed to is an accident of birth.

    Regarding your 12:34 pm comment, I think it would be a mistake to assume that Islamists etc. know the original source of either their funding or their orders. And the US will happily kill them if changing circumstances make that convenient; military assets are ultimately expendable. Train the fathers in Afghanistan, then torture the sons in Guantanamo.

    Now let’s see. It’s really windy here…

  51. Anon, 4 Feb, 12:15 am; thanks, I’ve read through some of it, but it’s going to take me a while. It doesn’t look very hopeful so far; more LWRs, still hoping for safe fast-spectrum reactors, more “spent” fuel, and I’ve found no mention of molten salt reactors yet. The French interest in transmutation of transuranics gets a mention, but the AMSTER MSR component of that proposal doesn’t. But I’m still reading…

    Uranium remains important, and the US should “discourage” other countries from doing their own enrichment – well, we’re certainly seeing that policy being applied to Iran.

  52. Brendan – This coalition is bent of course and subtle, even sly in its attempts to claw back further credit into its coffers.

    I present just two examples. There are many more:

    There are some major changes relating to Pension Credit. At present where a couple has one partner over PC age and the other under PC age, the older partner can claim PC for both.

    In future the younger partner will have to claim Universal Credit for both, which will be paid at a lower rate. The Welfare Reform Act also abolishes Housing Benefit, which is the means-tested benefit to help
    people with rent payments. PC will include a housing credit to help with rent payments instead. Child Tax Credit will also be abolished and in future people with dependent children will receive financial support for children through additional payments on Universal Credit or Pension Credit. At the moment there is no capital (savings) limit for Pension Credit and the Government is considering whether to introduce one.

    These changes are expected to save about £80M and destroy lives.

  53. Have we not got aspirations to better ourselves.

    Cameron was pulled up by The Guardian for his comments to an audience in Liberia of mostly children, when asked of their aspirations, doctors, lawyers, health workers were mentiined by the African children.

    Cameron complained British Kids only aspire to be famous , footballers, singers etc.

    With equality we are stuck in the perverbial mud.

    If we could ever raise the bar somewhere of a civil society,
    How then could we all aspire to better ourselves.

    The Mail on Sunday harping on about
    Waist sizes and alchohol consumption and big brother having our details of consuption.

    So what, we are unhealthy over consuming fat heads.

    I aspire to be healthier and cleverer.

    Hard you may say. But that is how we should be.

    Don’t you think the less fortunate see us and think yes they have all the privalages; so why do they use their potential.

    This equal society is maling us apathetic.

    Or at least some.

  54. “Well done, John Goss. You’re in good company. Max Keiser has recognised this young man, Laurent Louis, too”

    Well, if Max has “recognised” him (what does that mean, by the way?) he must be good, musn’t he :)

    Just as Max must be good because Davy’s recognised him :) :)

    BTW Davy : that’s twice you’ve used “old fart” within a half hour. Is your objection to the “old” or to the “fart”? I think we should be told.

    *********

    PS – agree with you 100% re. the Belgian Congo (run for a long time not as a colony but as the personal domain of that old bastard Leopold II.

  55. @ John Goss re. Laurent Louis:

    Well, you probably don’t know much about him other than the praise you seen heaped on him by people on this blog; and since his “ideas” probably coincide with yours, you obviously find him the cat’s whiskers. It’s rather human, in fact.

    Whereas I do happen to know a lot, not so much about M. Louis as about the general Belgian political scene.

    And therefore I can share the following confidential info with you. M. Louis is trying hard to make a name for himself as the young(ish) iconoclast of Belgian politics, the man who dares to reach parts other politicians daren’t. Hence an accelerating series of fairly violent speeches on topics of the day.

    Nothinjg to do with the fact that there will be a general election in Belgium next year, of course.

    BTW – M. Louis makes great play of being the first ever and only independent (ie without party) representative in the Chamber of Representatives. Less impressive, however, once you realise that he became independent by simply abolishing the political party which he had himself founded a year previously and of which he was the only representative in the Belgian parliament for the reason I gave in a previous post.

  56. Some very interesting archaeology and osteo-archaeology has taken place in Leicester. I was struck at how healthy the teeth were considering that the skeleton has been underground for near on 500 years.

    Richard III dig: DNA confirms bones are king’s
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-21063882#

    Other wounds included slashes or stabs to the face and the side of the head. There was also evidence of “humiliation” injuries, including a pelvic wound likely to have been caused by an upward thrust of a weapon, through the buttock.

    A horrible similarity to the brutal killing of Gaddafi there. Nothing changes.

  57. Meet my NBF! David Cameron and Tony Blair become chums…

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/meet-my-nbf-david-cameron-and-tony-blair-become-chums-8478494.html

    Tony ‘the advisor’ Blair takes refuge in ‘humility’ – another brazen, bare-faced lie – an arrogance, egotistic, pretentiousness, self-important human has no awareness of subjection.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2273039/Tony-Blair-giving-advice-Cameron-Miliband-understands-damned-difficult-jobs-are.html#axzz2Jld0e64h

  58. “Some very interesting archaeology [...] has taken place in Leicester.”

    No. Surely CanSpeccy wasn’t right after all, and they found the mass graves?

  59. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 3:59 pm

    resident dissident
    3 Feb, 2013 – 8:31 pm

    “Absolutely – perhaps one condition of the UN being able to deal effectively with breaches of its Charter is consistency with how it deals with those breaches. Lets not pretend that the US/Israel/UK are the only offenders.”

    No one is pretending that the US/Israel/UK are the only offenders it is you and your ilk that wants to pretend that critics of US/Israel/UK consider these states the only offenders. Which, as you know, is not true.

    “We do arm them as I’m sure you really know.” Yes but with Syria – the main supplier of arms is Russia.

    You seem to have a problem with Russia selling arms to Assad but no problem with the US/Israel/UK sending cash to allow known terrorist groups, who have no compunction about killing civilians, to buy arms from Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

  60. So Hababak.

    Seems l ike Mr Belgium no party mp has achieved alot b opy getting to where he is questioning the Parliament of his affiliated country.

    Most of us hanging here are lifes losers.

    What’s your excuse?

  61. @Jay 2:53pm

    “Cameron complained British Kids only aspire to be famous , footballers, singers etc.”

    Cameron and his uber-Tory fascistic ilk, along with the SDP/Liberal Trojan-Tories are entirely responsible for the sorry state of affairs he bemoans, the hypocritical imbecilic lying bastards. I’m glad there are so few aspiring to be like the mass-killers who rule us.

    The media pounds away with these TV programs which fan such idiotic beliefs, the print media fills pages with such related crap, as if it were actual news; it used to be football or boxing was a mythic route out of poverty, for the lucky and only truly rarely talented to find a way ‘out’. Combine that with clear lack of any real opportunity as wealth is all and taxation and laws assure that ill-gotten booty in whatever form it is held accumulates in the greedy hands of the few and is its own reward; cliques and sects, brotherhoods, old school-tie and the rest of the privileges through which a few live on the backs of the many’s toil, suffering and wastage, complete the decay and destruction of each successive generation that gives up, falls by the wayside, in this glorious meritocracy.

    The media never tire of telling the people they are useless scum, it is only a short step from there to proposing euthanistic solutions to this too-fat, too-thin, too intelligent or whatever means can be used to belittle the masses and undermine self-esteem. Human diversity and variability alone guarantees most will never become willing wage-slaves.

    I couldn’t follow the rest of your argument, care to clarify somewhat. Are you one of the ‘privileged’ performing chavs, can you kick a ball, mime with accompanying insincere and over the top grimaces, is life one endless whirl of Range Rovers crunching on white gravel? Are you having difficulties with your cook, maid or housekeeper? Do tell, here you’ll find many a cold shoulder to cry on. If you can do so without calling for the Syrian Shishakly (or maybe it’s Assad, the plan hasn’t changed since the fifites) to topple, to be replaced by a pro-Israeli Muslim Brothers Israeli hireling puppet, or can cause grievous offence to the mighty JBoD, well let’s just say you won’t be The Lucky One tonight (or tomorrow …)

  62. “Richard III dig: DNA confirms bones are king’s”

    They thought it would turn out to be him.

    They had a hunch.

  63. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    4 Feb, 2013 - 4:06 pm

    ” well, we’re certainly seeing that policy being applied to Iran.”

    Clark;

    When Hagel was being grilled as SecDef nominee, he said the goal is to ‘contain’ Iran. It’s was long the suspicion of Obama’s political rivals, here, that this has been Obama’s objective all along. Some also think the Hagel nomination was a big FY to Bibi. Hagel is no angel, but he has the chutzpah to pare down DARPA and Pentagon gluttony.

    The only way to be sure at this point, is to watch and see if Obama goes to the mat for his nominee. I really don’t know what his actual convictions are.

  64. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    4 Feb, 2013 - 4:20 pm

    Holy Shite. Is this true? Yowza ! The Airwaves really belong to the People?

    “The federal government wants to create super WiFi networks across the nation, so powerful and broad in reach that consumers could use them to make calls or surf the Internet without paying a cellphone bill every month.
    The proposal from the Federal Communications Commission has rattled the $178 billion wireless industry, which has launched a fierce lobbying effort to persuade policymakers to reconsider the idea, analysts say. That has been countered by an equally intense campaign from Google, Microsoft and other tech giants who say a free-for-all WiFi service would spark an explosion of innovations and devices that would benefit most Americans, especially the poor.”

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..story.html

  65. @BenF

    If Microsoft and Google back it, it deserves oblivion. I’d run a mile, screaming.
    The solution to mobile phone mast radiation IS – a hacksaw.

    http://www.bioinitiative.org

  66. “Habbabkuk
    4 Feb, 2013 – 11:00 am
    It just occurred to me : we have seen Assad the Father, we are now experiencing Assad the Son….and Allah willing, we might soon welcome Assad the Unholy Ghost.”

    Bye bye Bashir!, Hello Habbabkuk!

    Glad to see you back. I was a little worried about you being lost in parts where weather reports cannot reach. I want to be in such a space too but i’m f*****g stuck on this, as it would appear, God-forsaken planet. And Lucy can’t beckon me into her Sky with Diamonds.

    Anyhow, some Allah or God if these are our choices! Lets not blame it on him. What a bloody world WE have made. Why can’t we change?

    Human beings have been killing each other since time memorial. Over 5,000 wars have been fought in history. Wars are rooted in Man’s violent behaviour which in turn is inherited from the animal world. Even dogs have evolved to not be violent. But, despite our larger brain we have not been able to overcome our primeval nature. The content of man’s consciousness therefore includes fear, insecurity, aggression, conflict, greed so on and so forth.

    The answer to me is simple and obvious. Each one of us can understand this reality deeply and turn away from it, resulting in a transformation of mankind. But it isn’t happening, despite the terrible wars even within our living memory. I wonder if there is a critical mass tipping point at which _% of humans were able to ‘see’ this and the consequential effect on the aggregate of human consciousness, which is after all, an aggregate. This is the ‘balance sheet’ i am more interested in than the balance sheet of murderous scoundrels. What does it matter if X dictator killed more people than Y terrorist? In reality they are all the same; they all have blood on their hands.

    Hope is another dangerous thing. Look at all the hope people had in Obama. Did it change anything on the international frontiers? Has he been any better than GWB in this regard? I’m not talking US domestic politics, which i am not interested in. The Nobel Committee ran to rush him the Peace award. What utter and total fools we are. How do we break out of this vicious circle? Thats what i want to know.

    Will it take a nuclear holocaust for us to awaken? We are tempting that price. Why can’t we awaken?

    All genuine/sincere questions.

  67. Ben Franklin:

    “The federal government wants to create super WiFi networks across the nation,”

    Pure guesswork here, but check the small-print. Anything on stallman.org or eff about it? Who controls the encryption? Corporations, perhaps? The governments give away a fairly cheap resource (before the people wise-up and do it for themselves), but the corporations get to read everyone’s communication? I’ll put £10 on it…

  68. LastBlueBell

    4 Feb, 2013 - 4:36 pm

    @Arbed

    Thank you, likewise, your work is impressive, but I have not had the time to read through the thread yet, but I will put it on the list…

    @John Goss

    My pleasure. I can very well imagine that, and not only due to the language and cultural divide, since it is in many ways difficult even for ordinary Swedes to grasp, since much of this data does not reach the majority of the general population, you often have to actively dig into official records and reports to expose it.

    Another aspect is that internationally, the Nordic countries are often grouped together and viewed as one more or less homogeneous unit, and aspects of one country is generalized to all. In some aspects this works, but along other dimensions, it fails miserably.

    Another curious fact (slightly related to the previous) is that the Swedish police force only solves around 4% of all break ins compared to 25% in for example Finland, and the number of solved crimes has continued to decrease in Sweden over the last decade even as the police force during the same period has been increased with 3000 new officers, which equals an increase of roughly 15%

    This I believe also slowly eats away at the trust for the judicial system, which in the end transforms (or is at risk to feed) itselfs into a general decrease in trust and respect for the whole political system.

  69. Mary
    4 Feb, 2013 – 3:39 pm ” Nothing changes”

    Precisely my point in my post to Habbabkuk above. Any ideas?

  70. “before the people wise-up and do it for themselves”

    Like if everyone turned off wireless encryption on their routers, there’d be wifi everywhere with a population.

  71. Habby

    Larent Louis is “good” because what he says is true and he’s prepared to say it, when so many young people today in his position are gaming the system. Max is good because he knows the financial system well and can communicate that complexity to a wide audience. “Recogition” is just awareness.

    “Old fart” is a compound noun describing someone who lives in the past. It’s a mentality rather than a physicality. So, you can get young “old farts” like Niall Ferguson or the Rees Mogg boy.

    If you can appreciate the plunder and pillage of Belgian colonialism, as against the “we’re bringing them civilisation” nonsense that used to be preached, then you’re improving. When you understand that the current version of the “civilising” argument is “liberal intervention” then you’ll be well on your way.

    Hope that helps.

  72. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    4 Feb, 2013 - 4:42 pm

    Clark; The Telcoms are already giving them everything they want, but that could change (?), so maybe they just want to get rid of the middleman.

  73. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    4 Feb, 2013 - 4:49 pm

    Clark; EFF did link to this article….

    “If a government wants to peek into your Web-based e-mail account, it is surprisingly easy, most of the time not even requiring a judge’s approval.

    That is a problem, according to Google, which said it had received 21,389 requests for information about 33,634 of its users in the second half of last year, an increase of 70 percent in three years. Google handed over some personal data in two-thirds of those cases.”

    http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/28/google-says-electronic-snooping-by-governments-should-be-more-difficult/

    Sounds like they are passing the ball off…..

  74. Lastbluebell, thank you for your insights. very revealing.

    What beats me is that Sweden is a whole country of 9.5 million people?! And they can’t get their act together. I think they deserve to be sold to the Chinese. Or is that they are already in America’s change pocket.

    With respect, no personal affront meant. On the contrary, wish you well in sorting out this (enigma is too good a word), puddle of a puzzle.The trolls from Trollhattan are taking over.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Saabtrollsticker.png

  75. @ Villager :

    Yes, Villager, you posed some fair (and good) questions – in itself an achievement, although fonding the correct answers will be even more of one.

    I have a question (to myself as much as to you, I guess) about the “mass tipping point” you mention at roughly the middle of your post.

    You know that in the world of business, when Firm A takes over Firm B by acquiring a certain percentage of the shares, the so-called minority shareholders who resisted the takeover by refusing Firm A’s offer for their shares can be compulsorily bought out.

    Well, supposing there is a “mass tipping point” – given that we’re taking about attitudes and not shares – what happens to those not in the tipping mass? Will there really be a “consequential effect on the aggregate of human consciousness”, by which I think you mean that their attitudes will automatically switch to the new atttitude of the tipping mass. Or will there have to be compulsion as in the business example I offered above – if this is so, then I think we’re looking at violence again.

    But this is perhaps over my head, after all I’m just a simple troll.

  76. Today, as the main contractor pulls out of the substantial Sizewell C contract to build more PWR in this country, France, England, Germany Switzerland and Sweden should form a new consortium with the aim to recycle the existing nuclear waste.

    As some of you know PWR’s only use a small amount, they are, by design, very insufficient reactors which are inherently dangerous, but, produce plutonium.

    If the EU’s major countries decide to develop a modern evolutionary design to the AMSTER project, Thorium reactors that run on the existing stockpiles of waste we have accrued, by conservative estimates, some 1000 years of it.
    These plants are not hooked on water, don’t have water intakes that can be clogged up by fish who love warm water, and they don’t run under pressure, bar the steam produced.

    Further, these type of reactors can also be used, if I understand the principles right, to recycle some rare earth metals.

    This problem, according to insurance companies who sometimes think these scenario’s up, is negligible when compared to the risk factors of rising sea levels, should the current trend become norm.

    It should also occupy the minds of those who might want to plan/ contemplate striking each others first strike capabilities and add a multinational thermonuclear exchange into the equation.

    We must reduce and keep safe all plutonium and start reducing these long term liabilities which are only getting bigger.
    Thorium rectors still end with a product that is dangerous, but far less of it and much easier controlled.

    That said, we have not even started to scratch the surface of alternative capabilities open to us, people have not realised that they have the powers to generate their own, bar some Island community projects.

    Here we are subjected to NFFO subsidy hunters who cover the 24.6 odd acres under solar panels for the tax subsidies, not MP’s, no, its their parents/family who are doing it, rights next to the Waveney valley destined as a major electricity corridor, pylons or underground, it will come through from the North sea companies, the Royal Estate and the Norwegian Kings companies, all of who benefit from this NFFO and from the taxpayers for the power of their wind farms.

    These subsidies are mostly for the landed gentry and the few, rather than large communities doing it for themselves and to finance further energy saving schemes, as it was envisaged by this EU law.

    So there, today is a great chance for advancing a new agenda.

  77. @ David (16h42) :

    Yes Davy, it most certainly did help and I’m most grateful to you.

    To show my appreciation, I’d like to engage with just a couple of comments:

    1/. Is it possible that M. Louis and Max Keiser are “good” because you hold similar views to theirs, or are yoiu measuring them against some fixed, absolute ethical, moral or technical standard?

    2/. I hold no brief for Jacob Rees-Mogg, but you must be fair; he’s more generally condisered to be an Old Fogey, not anj Old Fart.

    3/. Re Belgian colonialism, I probably knew a lot about that when you were still doing it into your diapers. But that, of course, must be because I’m an Old Fart (emphasis on the Old, of course).

  78. Message from Mr Regev and Ms Avital Leibovitz. Note the word ‘militant’ always used in conjunction with the word ‘Hamas’.

    Israeli forces arrest Hamas members in the West Bank
    Israel launches regular operations in Palestinian run areas of the West Bank

    Israeli forces in the West Bank have arrested at least 20 members of the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

    Those arrested, in overnight raids all over the West Bank, included three members of the Palestinian parliament.

    Israel regards Hamas as a terrorist organisation, but has not said why the arrests were carried out.

    Palestinian human rights groups condemned the arrests, saying they aimed to undermine the reconciliation talks between Palestinian factions.

    Israel holds more than 4,500 Palestinians in its jails, 12 of them members of the Palestinian parliament, according to Palestinian reports.

    Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, settling more than 450,000 people in the territory.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-21322063

    ~~~
    Elsewhere, the BBC make an admission of lying.

    In a report last month on Israel’s racist “Judaization” policies in the Negev, BBC reporter Tim Whewell wrote that “Jewish and Arab citizens of Israel are guaranteed full equality by law.” Responding to my complaint, the BBC’s Middle East desk has acknowledged that this is not the case, and “agree the wording of the sentence in question is inaccurate.”

    The article has now been changed to say that “Israel says its Arab and Jewish citizens have equal rights under the law,” a claim followed up by testimony from a Negev Coexistence Forum activist that “in practice land policy in the Negev gives Bedouin fewer opportunities than Jews.”

    In my complaint, I pointed out that there is in fact no such guarantee [of full equality for Jewish and Palestinian citizens] by law, and I shared the following:

    http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ben-white/bbc-acknowledges-palestinian-citizens-israel-are-not-guaranteed-equality-law

  79. Villager, people don’t have wars. State power structures have wars. Show me one spontaneous war. When the people rise up, they do so against the power structures, and it’s called an uprising or a revolution.

    Men go through a brief period between puberty and parenthood where they are susceptible to the warmongers’ propaganda to the point that they will fight enthusiastically, but if they survive, the experience changes most of their minds. A few maintain their aggression longer and become potential warmongers themselves. But those two facts, exploited by the power structures, are enough to sustain war.

  80. @cryptonm

    Mate there are kids going hungary in the world, yet I c an buy a 20′ inch musical Fireman Sam. To go with all the crap we have available.
    What would be easier to make?

    I do not know what to say but, as it is we ain’t working for a better world for everyonend opportunities to promote goodness in us all.

  81. @Clark

    “Pure guesswork here, but check the small-print. Anything on stallman.org or eff about it? Who controls the encryption? Corporations, perhaps? The governments give away a fairly cheap resource (before the people wise-up and do it for themselves), but the corporations get to read everyone’s communication? I’ll put £10 on it…”

    Too de-centralised, why would they want a system where they’d have to be practically sitting on your doorstep, when they can already tap the lot once it inevitably enters the wired network. Citizen based open-access however where you have no idea, and neither does anyone else have any idea who’s using it or your’s, means they would go after the fixed wireless station’s owner, but still have to get local to find who may have or is using it –if interested enough they can. Future net appliances will be big brother friendly, accepting remote queries for cpuid, real hardware mac addresses than soft ones (with ipv6 and no NAT, devices could have globally unique ip’s) as well as divulging interesting content of storage media. Tale-telling black-boxes capable only of running closed source proprietary software, obeying remote command and control interfaces. The only future is open source and generic hardware. See the above bio-initiative link also for a wet-ware technology reset …

  82. habby

    1. I’m measuring them against a standard, in a variety of areas. One of the standards is knowledge and expertise and another is their preparedness to speak what they know.

    2. Old fogey and old fart are quite similar.

    3. Knowledge of Belgian colonialism even for quite a long time doesn’t qualify you as an old fart. You may for example now believe that colonialism was quite wicked and not something to be reimposed today under its contemporary moniker “liberal intervention”.

    You may however think that empire and colonialism is a brill killer app, like Niall Ferguson and be, as you say, an old fart in a very smelly old diaper.

  83. Villager, here’s a lovely little maxim. I don’t know if it is used in biology, which is the field in which it applies, but it is from a biology science fiction novel:

    “Macrocosm dominates microcosm”

    That’s the principle in operation when your body prevents, say, your liver cells from embarking on reproduction of their own. And it applies when power structures bend the will of individual people to do things against their own best interest.

    Ascribing war to individual aggression is as incorrect as ascribing individual aggression to the body’s cells.

  84. I agree Jay, most of what is manufactured is worthless useless crap. Most of the people in work produce or sell worthless crap, most of the pollution comes from producing this worthless useless crap, most of this stuff ends up in a skip or tip in short order. As long as someone’s making money and people are stupid enough to be easily convinced they want it.

    It’s all about face, vanity, conspicuous consumption. It isn’t a new phenomenon even in this country 150 years ago, the industrial revolution on the whole turned out in volume, not practicable usable necessities, but the equivalent clutter and junk as sought and bought now; ornaments, shiny buttons and buckles, impractical fashionable attire, cheap facsimilies of items they imagined the kleptomaniac ‘better’ classes obsessed over, imitating those vacant classes whom they aped in every way. No food on the table but such elegant plates. I’d guess then around about half and now around three-quarters of all in employment produce or do things which have absolutely no practical or social worth whatsoever.

  85. Villager, my above two comments answer your question as to why we see war from humans, and not in most other species: humans organise into structures but other species don’t. The occasional exceptions prove the rule, like “wars” between colonies of ants. Again, it’s the structures that are at war, and the structures control the individuals. In the case of the social insects, this is achieved through the whole colony being descended from one queen.

  86. Your ‘Wifi for everyone’ Clark reminded me of an incident some years ago when a neighbor knocked my door, laptop in hand and complained she had ‘lost’ her web connection. I noticed she was trying to connect to my router SSID!

    She explained my son had ‘set-up’ a connection for her some months back and she was paying him £5/month for the connection.

    So much for cyber-savvy teenagers.

  87. Habbabkuk, the Heineken ad reminds me of another ad-line: I used to be an accountant until I discovered Smirnoff. So yes, i understand your point about the Takeover Code. And yes, that kind of compulsion would definitely be violence.

    Let’s take a different scenario. Lets say there are a hundred of us living together in a village. Somehow this village is The World. Let us say 20, 30 or 40 of us, maybe even 10 are wise-men who have seen the truth that violence begets violence and love begets love. And, we actually live in that way day-to-day in grace, goodwill and respect. It is not contrived so our brains are wired for such natural response. We share this way of life with others regardless. What happens? Is this not going to influence other people? Won’t we be creating a better society? The 10 or 40 awakened men would engage in dialogue in relationship. Relationship is life; without relationship, there is no life. They would help point out with their fund of wisdom the profound truth that killing another human being is the worst ‘sin’.

    Now is that not consciousness at work–the transformation of its content? I admit when there is something i don’t know. I think its important we recognise what we don’t know as much as it maybe, if not mores, what we do know. People come here full of themselves, boasting how much knowledge they have. In fact we, all of humanity know so little, it become ever more important to recognise how little we know. Which is why i go on reminding myself and other ‘modern’ humans here that we are but a Type Zero Global Civilisation. Seven billion idiots, dancing in the dark, on a pinhead in the Universe and I am one of them. Taking ourselves so seriously that we are happy to slaughter our own species.

  88. @ Cryptonym

    Thank for you reply, what would be achievable regarding welfare of people world wide could be reached through the making of simple decisions.

    As for the structure of society, planting and nurturing the planet could keep us busy.

  89. Cryptonym, 4 Feb, 5:16 pm:

    “Too de-centralised, why would they want a system where they’d have to be practically sitting on your doorstep, when they can already tap the lot once it inevitably enters the wired network?”

    Like I said, we need to see the small-print, or rather, the actual proposal. The traffic will probably be routed through central points that can be monitored. That, or as you say, only identifiable devices will be permitted to connect. I’ll bet that they’re making the proposal to pre-empt a “People’s WiFi Movement”.

    Thanks for the Bioinitiative link.

    Mark Golding, that made me laugh out loud. That’s a cheeky lad you’ve got there; I hope you’ve charged the money back from him!

  90. Villager, I offer the things I’ve learned because I hope that they may help, as well as to make myself feel more worthy. This is a sort of enlightened self-interest, as would be teaching that violence be-gets violence and love be-gets love.

    Maybe you live in some horribly violent place. I live near Chelmsford, not far from London, but when I visit these places the level of violence is notably low. Humans are not hell-bent upon violence, and war is caused through structure. I offer this in the hope that it comforts you, and helps you to feel more at ease with human nature, which we both share.

  91. Clark, thank you very much for all you responses. Lest you misunderstand, i’m not in anyway ignoring you. Just going to take a break and hopefully engage further.

    Re: “Maybe you live in some horribly violent place. ”

    Yes its called Planet Earth! Which is a beautiful ‘blue’ planet but the society and consequent structures we have built are ugly as Hell. And most of its inhabitants live in the hope that there is a Heaven, a better place somewhere out there, after life. Life is supposed to be precious, it is. This should be our Heaven. For the butterflies it is! And if we can not make this our Heaven forget about finding it elsewhere!

    Btw, an interesting fact about butterflies. One single love-making session of a butterfly, when you adjust for relative average life-lengths, is equivalent to two-years in human life.

    Let that not detract from the seriousness of our conversation.

  92. Did anyone know that there was new body called the College of Policing, based in Coventry?

    ‘College Of Policing Limited is an Active business incorporated in England & Wales on 1st October 2012. Their business activity has not been recorded. College Of Policing Limited is run by 3 current members. It has no share capital. It is not part of a group. The company has not yet filed accounts. College Of Policing Limited’s risk score was amended on 06/12/2012.’

    http://companycheck.co.uk/company/08235199

    The head of it is the ex Chief Constable of Hampshire, Alex Marshall.

    http://companycheck.co.uk/company/08235199

    The college, like ACPO, is a private limited company as you can see. Who funds it, how and why was it set up etc etc ???.

    One of its directors Stephen Rimmer was a director of JSSC, another limited company. The acronymn is not explained but on Company Search it is described

    ‘Jssc is an Active business incorporated in England & Wales on 9th July 2003. Their business activity is recorded as Justice And Judicial Activities. Jssc is run by 13 current members. and 1 company secretary. It has no share capital. It is also part of a group. The latest Annual Accounts submitted to Companies House for the year up to 31/03/2012 reported ‘cash at bank’ of £2,993,385, ‘liabilities’ worth £904,701, ‘net worth’ of £2,501,494 and ‘assets’ worth £3,363,393. Jssc’s risk score was amended on 07/01/2013.’

    All these directors. http://companycheck.co.uk/company/04826715/JSSC Do the many names ring any bells?

  93. Good one Mary, diligently opening the structures to view.

    Yes, where’s the public’s feedback control over this one? What, it doesn’t exist? Well I never…

  94. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 7:31 pm

    resident dissident
    3 Feb, 2013 – 8:39 pm

    @David

    “Most of the dictators in the world have been created and sustained by the West. That’s the whole point.”

    “I think that this is difficult to argue with the bigger most significant dictatorships in Russia and China – which continue to support many dictatorships elsewhere.”

    Syria aside, which dictatorships do Russia and China support? Just for the record?

  95. Thanks Clark. One of the JSSC directors’ names was Paul McKeever. I knew it was familiar.

    College of Policing pays tribute to Paul McKeever

    College Of Policing – College Press Releases
    Written by Peter Mandich (peter.mandich@college.pnn.police.uk)
    Friday, 18 January 2013

    CEO Designate Chief Constable Alex Marshall has today paid tribute to Paul McKeever, the national chair of the Police Federation, who has sadly died.

    Mr Marshall said:

    “I was shocked and saddened to hear the news that Paul McKeever has died today. Paul led the Federation, at national level, since 2008 with exceptional passion and determination. He was a big voice in policing and a highly impressive public speaker, and he will be a loss to the policing debate. We extend our deepest sympathies to his family and friends.”

    http://college.pressofficeadmin.com/component/content/article/45-press-releases/583

  96. @Clark “Look, climate science is a huge topic, it’s bound to submerge any discussion about Assange and the Guardian’s obvious smear campaign against him. And if you’re really so enthralled about letting Mother Nature have her way, why on Earth are you using the Internet? Surely, shouting distance is all we’re allowed. No, don’t answer that

    OK, only a bit more from me on this, not meaning to distract from Assange and the Guardian – but then again, look at the thread so far…

    …to note that you did not answer, even with a one-liner, or a yes or no, my short challenge regarding pole shifts and the inevitable burnout of the sun…

    Martin Rees, holder of the Mastership of Trinity College, Cambride, probably the most prestigious academic post in Britain, strikes me as insane, as much as George III was insane, when he says – as if he believes it, because the loony probably does – that what people do now will significantly affect the world for billions of years to come.

    That’s a truly nutcase variation on the usual farewell speech in which the outgoing Prez tells the assembled throng that ‘during my presidency we have experienced momentous events, and during the incumbency of my successor there are likely to be many more’</em?)…

    Billions of years? Like yeah, right. And I'm Jesus Christ, right at the fulcrum…

    This is important, because there is function for apocalypticism, and there is going to be a major collapse fairly soon…

    I have to observe that your arguing techniques in the sentences following your first one are naff. You and I both use the internet. That doesn’t make my opposition to the view that ‘we’ should aim to ‘control the climate’ hypocritical or mistaken. There’s a difference being recognising the reality that one lives in this society and, on the other hand, believing that going with the flow thereof is the only sane choice…

    For the record, in the kind of society I want, no, there would be no internet.

    I assume that in the kind of society you want, there would be. Where do you draw the line? Would there be Twitter? Would there be 10,000 step campaigns and pedometers?

    OK I realise I am trying to continue this…but it’s interesting…my motives are good…

  97. Jay: “As for the structure of society, planting and nurturing the planet could keep us busy.”

    Good one, Jay.

    There is an old Chinese saying:

    If you want to be happy for a day, get drunk. If you want to be happy for a week, get married. If you want to be happy for a lifetime, become a gardner.

  98. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 8:12 pm

    LastBlueBell
    4 Feb, 2013 – 12:12 am

    “…serious shortcomings within the Swedish legal systems, that among many other things found:

    * Manipulation of evidence, and verdicts based on inconclusive evidence
    * Partial prosecutors
    * The courts overlooking outright failures in the underlying investigations.
    * Insufficient examination of the plaintiff’s stories.”

    Sounds very much like the Lay magistrate system here in the UK. I kid you not!

  99. Thanks again LastBlueBell for your enlightening Swedish statistics.

    Change of topic. So they found Richard III bones under a parking lot? He must have been killed looking for where he’d tethered the horse he would have given his kingdom to find. Unless Shakespeare was having us on.

    Change of topic. Serious. Here is Dady Chery talking to Carlos Gomez about how we might honour Aaron Swartz.

    http://www.dadychery.org/2013/02/04/how-might-we-honor-aaron-swartz-an-interview/

  100. A different company search site says this about JSSC. Curiouser and curiouser?

    Jssc was registered on 09 Jul 2003. The business has a status of active. They were founded by Custodial Care National Training Organisation, Community Justice National Training Organisation, and Police Skills and Standards Organisation. They have 1 subsidiary. The company has assets totalling £3,406,195 plus total liabilities totalling £904,701. They owe £133,631 to creditors and are due £45,740 from trade debtors. As of their last financial statement, they had £2,993,385 in cash reserves. Their book value is £2,501,494, and the value of their shareholders’ fund is £2,501,494.

    https://www.duedil.com/company/04826715/jssc

    Why these private companies for what are national state services?

  101. Villager, for when you return…

    Humans have already invented the solution to war. It is democracy, where the people get to choose leaders who won’t subject them to war. However, current implementations of democracy are inadequate, for a number of reasons. Here are some I can think of, in the order it occurs to me to mention them.

    Current “democratic” systems aren’t democratic enough. Voters get to cast thirty or so votes in a lifetime. But the “elected representatives” get lobbied almost continually by vested interests. They share their allegiance with corporations who pay them as “consultants”, or promise them well-paid jobs after their term in government, or just plain bribe them or blackmail them.

    Democracy requires that the voters be well informed, but this function is currently handled mostly by media corporations. These corporations benefit ($£) from war, so they misinform the voters and encourage war-like attitudes, and they refrain from showing the full horror of war lest it evoke empathy.

    The largest democratic units are too small. It can be in the interests of the people of country A to conquer weaker country B, but the interests of the people of A and B together is to cooperate rather than fight.

    The corporations have continued to grow, and now some of the smaller countries are less powerful than some of the larger corporations. Global corporations can “play off” one democracy against another.

    Democracy is too slow. When a government decides to go to war against the will of the electorate, they can’t be voted out before it is too late.

    Democracy is too crude. Voters get to vote for one national representative, often out of a choice of only two who could possibly win. This means that there is often no good choice, or one candidate represents a good foreign policy but a bad domestic policy, and the other vice-versa.

  102. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 8:41 pm

    Habbabkuk
    4 Feb, 2013 – 9:08 am

    Doug Scorgie wrote at 17h43 on 3 February ;

    “I have no doubt that Assad and his military have committed crimes but I doubt they amount to more than those committed by the rebels and the western false-flag attacks on civilian targets”

    “They should all of course be held to account”

    At last! Thank you and well done, Resident Dissident, for obtaining this admission! He took his time making it.

    Habbabkuk; resident dissident did not obtain an admission from me.

    What I said was my long held view on the matter.

    It is strange that some, like you, ignore the crimes committed by an entity you support (Israel for example) and focus only on the crimes of those entities you don’t support (Hamas for example). I acknowledge crimes are committed by all sides in a conflict.

  103. LOL. From the local rag here.

    A ROYAL Holloway graduate is appearing on cinema screens across the world playing al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden.

    Drama alumna Ricky Sekhon, 29, landed the role in the hugely touted and multi-Oscar nominated film Zero Dark Thirty, which opened in the UK last Friday.

    http://www.getsurrey.co.uk/entertainment/film_and_cinema/s/2128224_drama_graduates_eyeopening_bin_laden_role

    I wonder if this Ac Tor believes the story about the character he played. Did OBL die years back from renal failure? Was the Navy Seal action in Pakistan a psyop? Is Alki Ada for real? Do bears ^^^^ in woods?

  104. N_, shall we hop over to the previous thread? I should have thought of that earlier…

  105. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 9:15 pm

    Clark
    4 Feb, 2013 – 2:07 pm

    “When problems are complex, the human mind has a regrettable tendency to simplify; often this takes the form of choosing one “side” or the other. The corporate media exploits this…”

    This brought to mind a time when I worked for a large supermarket. The manager told me that the company commissioned psychologists for advice on things like product placement and other tactics to draw customer’s attention to help enhance sales.

    Advertising companies no doubt do the same but what about political parties? After all they are trying to sell something as well.

    I wonder if this explains why the policies of all three major parties in the UK are practically indistinguishable. Are they using behavioural psychology advisors?

    See:
    http://www.director.co.uk/MAGAZINE/2010/11_December/behavioural-psychology_64_04.html

  106. Davy,

    So you’re measuring M. Laurent Louis and Max Keiser against standards in a variety of areas, including “knowledge and expertise” and “preparedness to speak what they know”, and against those standards you find them “good”.

    Splendid! But whose are the standards you measure them against : are they your own standards or are you using standards which have found general acceptance and are set out somewhere?

    If you’re using your own standards, then we would have to know what you consider to be a “good” level of knowledge and expertise and we would also need to be able to evaluate your own level of knowledge and expertise in order to reach an opinion on whether you are, in fact, capable of evaluating the knowledge and expertise of others.

    If the latter, then it would be interesting to earn what those standards are, with as close an indication of sources as possible.

    It may be unkind of me, but I hazard the guess that you have no particular knowledge or expertise in the majority of the matters which preoccupy Messrs Louis and Keiser and thus reach the conclusion that you are not really qualified to judge their own knowledge and expertise.

    Re. “preparedness to speak what they know” : leaving aside the question of what they do actually know (as opposed to what they proclaim to be the true state of affairs), I don’t really find their “outspokenness” to rest on any particular qualities of “goodness”. As already explained, M. Louis has a general election coming up and he very much wants to remain a member of a chamber he claims to despise, whereas Mr Keiser, as much showman as serious analyst, works for Russia Today TV, which is about as independent of the Kremlin as the BBC is of Westminster and Whitehall.

    ****

    On the last bit of your post, you are equating colonialism and liberal intervention. In my opinion they are not the same things at all.

  107. You are a treasure here Mary. The College of Policing it seems is a private interim structure erected to support the National Crime Agency during the phasing out of the public National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA).

    http://www.npia.police.uk/en/16761.htm

    A key company article and function of the College is the assimilation of raw data from intelligence, the Police National Database, community surveillance and other information entered into the Police On-Line Knowledge Area (POLKA) so that a public information sharing strategy can be effective and generate a positive impact on the reduction of major crime esp. terrorism, explosives, drug trafficking and public order (mob rule).

    http://www.college.police.uk/en/16173.htm

    http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/publications/about-us/parliamentary-business/written-ministerial-statement/npia-transition-update/?view=Standard&pubID=1016151

    The work set out also includes enhancements to surveillance and preemptive measures using the latest technologies – UAV’s????

    As expected with this coalition the police service including support services such as forensics etc is undergoing privatisation. Theresa May and her Home Office must ensure this will improve quality and efficiency, implant trust and build public support.

    OY VEY!

  108. @ Doug Scorgie (20h21)

    Ah, so it was your “long-held view on the matter”, was it? A long-held view kept nicely to yourself as far as this blog was concerned, until Resident dissident squeezed it out of you.

    And while you’re trying to demolish me; you could try to quote me accxurately and not leave out an important element of my original post. Which was : when making comparisons of how deadly the Syrian regime is, you have to also take into account the last 30 years duirng which Syria has been run by the family firm of Assad the Father and Assad the Son.

    And lastly, I’d be very glad if you could find one post of mine that so much as mentions Hamas. And if you look carefully, you’ll find that most of my posts which mention Israel (there are few of them) do so in a negative way. But hey, what’s a little bit of accuracy when Dou’s in full, indignant flow?

    All in all, not one of your better posts (beta double minus at best). I think a sabbatical would do you good.

  109. doug scorgie, I’d be very surprised if the political parties aren’t doing just that. They hire PR and advertising firms, and behavioural psychologists will be on those companies’ staff. Either that or those companies are incompetent. Hell, corporations probably supply those services free, just to get their preferred party into power. Can you imagine it not being done? I can’t.

  110. Here’s a light-hearted challenge to all interested to dispell, if only temporarily, the air of gloom and despondency which too often hangs over this blog.

    If you were designing and writing a business card for the family firm of Assad and Assad (aka in the French speaking world as Assad et fils), what would you write on it to capture its special skills and what it has to offer?

  111. @ Clark and Doug Scorgie : of course they do! Where have you been for the last 20 years – hibernating?? Don’t you read political memoirs and diaries???

  112. English Knight

    4 Feb, 2013 - 9:57 pm

    After the all encompassing cause n effect net of 911, next time there will not be a refugee (safe in Manchester like Gerald Kaufman) who will dish out her bounty as a thank you to a fellow pussy starved Englishman, and give rise to a habbabkyke sayanim type wishfully thinking of “get well soon” cards for Assad & Assange!!

  113. N_, 4 Feb, 8:06 pm; I’ve posted an answer on the previous thread:

    http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2013/01/whatever-happened-to-craig-murray/#comment-392120

  114. BrianFujisan

    4 Feb, 2013 - 10:04 pm

    Wonder if there’s any truth in this one. And if there is, they would never admit it, or would they as another excuse to wage war on internet freedoms.

    But anyway ‘Anonymous’ response to the ( make an example of ) hounding to suicide of Internet activist Aaron Swartz, through operation Last Resort, Claims Hack On Government Site, Posts 4,000 Bank Exec Credentials

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/04/anonymous-oplastresort-hacks-government-posts-bank-credential_n_2615605.html

  115. Habbabkuk, no, I don’t read political memoirs or diaries. I’m more interested in pond life than most politicians. I only remember specific political events to use as evidence. My interest is in structure. My structural understanding suggested that politicians would use such techniques. You, with interest in the primary sources, confirm this. I’m entirely unsurprised; thank you very much.

  116. resident dissident

    4 Feb, 2013 - 10:10 pm

    I must say this blog thread is a fascinating insight as to how the cult of Assange works. Disciples Arbed and LastBluebell both quote chunks from their scriptures as to why the Swedish legal system is an evil and pernicious thing – I could point out exactly where they have cut and paste their extracts from but I will spare them the embarassment, especially since I very much doubt that they understand the links in Swedish (and I certainly don’t – but of course that didn’t stop Arbed having a go at Andrew Brown for not bothering to translate some of his Swedish links for which he apologised. Being true disciples they of course congratulate each other for their skills in cutting and pasting and lo and behold other disciples join in the rejoicing – and they can all take comfort in the strength of their Gospel and give praise to their Messiah and his prophets – I see Gorgeous George as a sort of John the Baptist figure – Pilger is a sort of Old Testament Prophet, while Craig is one of those who are quite keen to join the leading disciples but never quite makes the grade. Of course there are plenty of Judases (the Guardian being the prime one as they sold the Master’s gospel for pieces of silver and then turned their back on him) and more than one devil, (although the Bliar such appear to have a long standing ng a modern and sophisticated cult which seeks to improve on it predecessors.

    Of course none of this really adds very much to the debate that has already occurred with regard to the Swedish judicial system. I wasn’t proclaiming perfection on its part – like any legal system it makes mistakes – that is why it has appeal processes and the fact that it is capable of recognising and correcting its mistakes is a sign of its strength not a weakness (not many legal decisions were overturned in Saddam’s Iraq or Assad’s Syria). Sweden is being singled out by Amnesty or Human Rights Watch, or having a whole load of its decisions challenged in the Europen Courts. And if anyone bothered to look at the figures you would see that it actually acquits a large proportion of rape cases after they have gone through the due process that the blessed one is seeking to avoid at all costs. Perhaps the one thing that convinces me the most is that you never heard many members of the cult criticising the Swedish Legal system when the blessed one was using that country as a shelter from his enemies.

    Doug Scorgie
    Well I thought we were making some progress when you eventually came round to admitting that Papa Assad and his boy had been a little bit naughty (funny how much political good never seems to come out of nepotism – and my all means count in the family Bush on that score) – but then you spoil it by your characterisation of Cuba as a type of democracy (although I can be charitable and assume that you mistyped no as a) and then even worse link me in with the ilk that cannot bear no criticism of the US, Uk and Israel – well I’m sorry you are very wrong on that score – I can and do criticise regularly on that score (please look at my past posts), but I can assure that just as I don’t like Assad lobbing shells onto Palestinian refugee camps I am pretty disgusted when the Israelis do the same. Perhaps the difference is that I can see the good features in those countries as well – and the UK and the US have plenty of those and so does Israel to a lesser extent – and the balance between good and bad is somewhat different to that in Syria where I find the judgement (and that is what it is – rather than being tied by the views of one cult or another.

    Habbakkuk – thanks for the warning – but I think they have already accused me of being you – I think the Virgin Mary accused me of being a sock puppet.

    Cue indignation from the righteous and probably excommunication.

  117. http://matthewfharris.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/hughes-and-huhne-at-lib-dem-friends-of.html

    How the mighty are fallen. Revolting people.

    Tuesday, 18 December 2012

    Hughes and Huhne at Lib Dem Friends of Israel AGM

    Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel has issued the following press release:

    HUGHES AND HUHNE AT LIB DEM FRIENDS OF ISRAEL AGM

    Members of Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel (LDFI) were joined by senior Lib Dem MPs at LDFI’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Parliament last week.

    Attendees included Lib Dem Deputy Leader Simon Hughes MP, former Cabinet Minister Chris Huhne MP, Lord (Monroe) Palmer and Lord (Alex) Carlile.

    Lord (Chris) Rennard, a former party Chief Executive and elections supremo, spoke to the meeting about his trip to Israel and the West Bank as part of an LDFI Parliamentary delegation.

    Recalling a packed schedule of meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders and with grassroots citizens, Lord Rennard explained how the visit had informed his thinking on how best to achieve a two-state solution that would bring peace, justice and security to Israelis and Palestinians alike.

    LDFI’s honorary officers reported on a busy year that included the Parliamentary delegation, a successful party conference fringe meeting and regular briefings for Lib Dem leaders on issues affecting Israel and the Anglo-Jewish community.

    Former Lib Dem Deputy Leader Sir Alan Beith MP was confirmed as LDFI’s President, with Lord (Monroe) Palmer and London Lib Dem MEP Sarah Ludford continuing as Vice-Presidents.

    Gavin Stollar, who was re-elected as Honorary Chairman, updated the meeting on the planned recruitment of LDFI’s first-ever Executive Director, and said: “LDFI has had a year of great progress, as we took Parliamentarians to Israel and the West Bank, regularly briefed party leaders and continued to make the case for a just two-state solution to the Israel/Palestine conflict.”

  118. habby

    In the last bit of your reply you say that colonialism and liberal intervention are not the same thing at all.

    That’s fair enough so far as it goes. Clearly, for example, you don’t now need to set up a colony in order to do a bit of liberal intervening.

    But surely you’re not merely arguing the methods?

    Colonialism and liberal intervention have similar objectives, do they not, in exploiting and plundering the resources of other peoples lands or otherwise taking control of their resources?

    Or, do you argue that liberal intervention and colonialism arise out of the West’s desire to do good works for those less fortunate than themselves.

    Let’s just see how we get on with this before we move on to anything more complex.

  119. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 10:17 pm

    A man arrested after being Tasered outside Buckingham Palace as he held a knife to his [own] neck has been charged with possessing a bladed weapon in public and affray.

    Talhat Rehman will appear in custody at Westminster Magistrates Court today.

    http://www.itv.com/news/story/2013-02-03/man-tasered-buckingham-palace/

    In English common law, affray is a public order offence consisting of the fighting of two or more persons in a public place to the terror of ordinary people.

    How can he be charged with affray when he was alone?

    I guess he is mentally ill and needs help but our police and justice system does not really make allowances for mental illness.

  120. resident dissident, if you were in Assange’s position, would you feel safe from establishment persecution for your Wikileaks work in submitting yourself to custody?

  121. We might not find out about much of what is happening in Mali:

    http://www.cpj.org/security/2013/01/in-mali-a-war-without-images-and-without-facts.php

  122. Davy (22h16)

    As you only take me up on the last 2 lines of my comment, I will assume that you are either in agreement with the rest of what I wrote or perhaps don’t want to tease out a little further the question of standards (yours and others’).

    OK, to the question of colonialism / liberal intervention.

    No, I don’t believe that the objectives of colonialism and liberal intervention are the same at all. Does anyone?

  123. @ Resident Dissident (22h10 : yes, you are like Lucifer cast down…. (and I am Beelzebub).

    Woe unto us!

  124. @Doug, re. Talhat Rehman, the common law offence of affray was abolished by the Public Order Act 1986, which set up the statutory offence of affray which is presumably what he’s been charged with.

    S3(1): “A person is guilty of affray if he uses or threatens unlawful violence towards another and his conduct is such as would cause a person of reasonable firmness present at the scene to fear for his personal safety.”

    Have you watched the video footage? Those who don’t know the effects of being attacked with an electroshock weapon (‘Taser’) might think that he was waving his arms around in an attempt to put the policeman off his guard or threaten him. In actual fact, the weapon causes involuntary muscle spasms and a sudden pain bringing what is basically paralysis. That is why it was used.

    The lasting psychological effect of the Taser is often what I’ve also seen ascribed – with abhorrence, by John McVicar, here – to the 240 volt DC WW2-era signal generator used as a torture weapon by London gangster Charlie Richardson: people who’ve experienced it once go like jelly at the thought of being attacked with it again.

  125. To all my valiant friends,

    I have noticed that we have a new puffball here who calls himself the “resident”. Probably read some Le Carré´s prose to acquire the appropriate terminology but he seems to me as someone too unsettled to be any kind of resident. To be fair, a mental asylum is one potential location for his residency but have those institutions got already an access to internet? A dreadful thought to even contemplate. In any case, his boss would hold him back if he was one. He writes somewhat in the style of the demented hahababa. “Might they perhaps be related” as any past and present editor of Private Eye may ask. Quite probable as I cannot exclude the possibility that our resident puffball is also a linguist of some calibre with an ancestry from the fabulous kingdom of Khazaria.

  126. Habbabkuk, 4 Feb, 10:59 pm:

    “No, I don’t believe that the objectives of colonialism and liberal intervention are the same at all. Does anyone?”

    Yes, I think that there’s quite a large degree of overlap, noticeable similarities. But it would have to be examined on a case-by-case basis.

    Iraq 2003 would be one place to start. That was framed partly as “liberal intervention”, particularly by its apologists. But it was obviously an oil-grab.

    Afghanistan? “There’s Good Money in Death”:

    http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2007/08/theres_good_mon/

  127. Life after government is foremost in our politician’s minds. It exists as a business model in most politicians have heads.

    Britain and America have lost the capacity to govern. On a wide range of critical issues – from global warming to welfare & tax reforms, from regulation of the banks, from effective financial regulation to NHS and health-care changes, from the deficit to defense spending – we have lost the capacity to do anything other than suffer through a miserable status quo. If there is a ship of state, its rudder has been lost. We are drifting. We can’t change course. And eventually, and with absolute certainty, in waters such as these, a drifting ship will sink.

    This coalition has devolved decisions that affect our lives down to local councils. I ask, is it time to roll out direct democracy starting with local government? Is it time to address the corruption we know exists for instance at local tendering and procurement levels?

    Here Lawrence Lessig attempts to open some blocked channels:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0Q53rr8bg8

    In memory of Aaron Swartz

  128. doug scorgie

    4 Feb, 2013 - 11:40 pm

    Habbabkuk
    4 Feb, 2013 – 9:34 pm

    “Ah, so it was your “long-held view on the matter”, was it? A long-held view kept nicely to yourself as far as this blog was concerned, until Resident dissident squeezed it out of you.”

    Resident dissident couldn’t squeeze the juice out of a soft orange. I note you are now comrades.

    I have long held views on many subjects but I don’t try to force them down people’s throats. If the circumstances arise I will make my views known. I’m not trying to hide anything and I’m not devious by nature as I suspect you are.

    Habbabkuk: “And while you’re trying to demolish me; you could try to quote me accxurately [sic] and not leave out an important element of my original post.”

    Habbsy baby this is precisely what you do to every comment made by others – leave out important elements.

    Habbabkuk: “…when making comparisons of how deadly the Syrian regime is, you have to also take into account the last 30 years duirng [sic] which Syria has been run by the family firm of Assad the Father and Assad the Son.”

    How about taking into account the last 65 years of crimes committed by Jewish Zionists and Israeli governments?

    To reiterate (look it up) I do not support the Assad regime but for some reason you don’t like me to say that. Does it confuse you and take the wind out of your sails?

  129. The liars at the Torygraph say he was “stopped by police with a Taser stun gun as he ran towards Buckingham Palace”.

    Their also say: “As an officer tried to intervene, he lunged at him waving both knives and was shot with the stun gun before being arrested and taken away in a police van.

    That obviously implies that a policeman acted peacefully, then the man “lunged” at him, and so he or another policeman shot him with the electroshock weapon.

    That isn’t true. He isn’t threatening anyone when the policeman shoots him. After being shot, his arms do flail, but if the weapon was working properly – and we can assume from the fact that he falls to the ground that it was – then he was not in control of his arms at the time.

    The police have stated that he wasn’t threatening civilians.

    Even without consideration of mental health issues, the affray charge should be dropped.

    Of course…different rules apply in this ridiculous country whenever the royal family are concerned.

  130. Habbabkuk, here’s another you may find interesting:

    http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2007/08/j_a_hobson_impe/

    “Seeing that the Imperialism of the last three decades is clearly condemned as a business policy, in that at enormous expense it has procured a small, bad, unsafe increase of markets, and has jeopardised the entire wealth of the nation in rousing the strong resentment of other nations, we may ask, “How is the British nation induced to embark upon such unsound business?” The only possible answer is that the business interests of the nation as a whole are subordinated to those of certain sectional interests that usurp control of the national resources and use them for their private gain. This is no strange or monstrous charge to bring; it is the commonest disease of all forms of government.”

    I’d also recommend John Pilger’s book, Hidden Agendas, which has many examples.

  131. habby

    There’s more substance and interest in your last two lines than in the epistemological twaddle you were spouting in the previous twenty lines, but still I’ll address that too if we can make some progress on the more substantive matter.

    To that end perhaps you could explain what you see as the major differences in terms of objectives between colonialism and liberal intervention.

  132. LastBlueBell

    5 Feb, 2013 - 12:00 am

    @Doug Scorgie, 8:12

    That is tragic to hear! So much rest upon this trust, and that this power is handled with care and integrity.

    @Clark

    Have you had the opportunity to read Steven Pinkers, “The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined”? If not, I can only recommend a closer look.

  133. LastBlueBell, no, I’ll have to add it to my reading list. Thanks.

    N_, in case you missed my earlier note, I’ve replied to you on the previous thread.

  134. @Villager, I still intend to follow-up on our discussion in the previous thread, but work & family commitments at present are just not allowing me the time & space to respond as I would like to.

    Remember that I mentioned Chris Hedges to you, well here’s a great interview which connects directly with the exchange you have just had here with Clark;

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=sghyDCzIqMk#!

  135. Just seen this;

    The US could launch pre-emptive cyber strikes

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-draws-up-battle-plan-to-stave-off-digital-attack-cyberstrikes-8480656.html

    More outward projections unto others for what they do themselves, a la Stuxnet.

    In a stroke of delusional inspired logic, Stuxnet can now be retroactively justifield as essential pre-emption, nevermind that there is evidence that it turned the fukushima disaster into a full blown catastrophe.

  136. Richard 3rd’s bones dug up in a Leicester car park.

    Declared fit for work by ATOS.

  137. Lastbluebell, i saw that recommendation of Steven Pinker’s book and intend to read it. Thank you. Hope he’s right and not just looking through rose-tinted glasses.

    Born well post-war, i have no personal recall of those upheavals. Also i was never a good student of history, preferring to live in the moment, i exempted myself from the subject never having passed a history exam in my life.

    But i do recall our march to the millennium and the painted picture that we, humanity, were walking into a rainbow. Look where we are now. As for me, i’d rather have the days of blow-jos in the Oval Office and the Y2K being the major problems of the day to grapple with.

    The Islamic fundamentalist is of course a massive issue to contend with in our times, a clash of civilisations. Millions have been killed in the name of Christianity. Now it is the time of the Islamists. It doesn’t look like the Angels are going to visit anytime soon. But who knows we might be saved by some wise aliens from space.

    Meantime, i’m none too excited about reincarnation, not into this planet. Except perhaps as a butterfly. There’s got to be a better place.

  138. English Knight

    5 Feb, 2013 - 5:04 am

    @Macky – The AIPACS are in full control of the US State Department, etc. But Dempsey & the Pentagon are still beyond the reach of the organised jewry. Pre-emptive cyberstrike is simple a satanic plot devised by Cohen & Co to short circuit Dempsey & Co and take the country to war regardless, which the US Military would then have to reluctantly follow. Its a classic “sum dum wasp goyim” situation ! That the NYT has spun this “secret legal review” is enough proof their ilk Cohen & Co are behind this satanic plot – some transparency over the composition of the “secret legal review” team should say it all.

  139. English Knob, how stupid of me. Obviously, war isn’t caused by structure, it’s caused by Jews. That’s why we see battles between ant colonies; every so often, an ant turns into a Jew and gets much bigger, or maybe it happens the other way around.

    I’m glad we’ve got you, fighting for England. You’ll kill all those dangerous Jews. I feel safe now.

  140. Jives, thanks for making me laugh.

  141. doug scorgie

    5 Feb, 2013 - 7:14 am

    Habbabkuk
    4 Feb, 2013 – 9:45 pm

    “Don’t you read political memoirs and diaries???”

    No I don’t, but please direct me to those that refer specifically to the use of behavioural psychologists and I will.

  142. Karel

    I think Resident Dissident occasionally goes away to visit his Desirable Residence leaving a Visiting Dissident with a noticeably different style and message in his/her place. His/her main theme is that Craig’s and others’ rather old-fashioned British sense of justice is misguided. Craig has a knack of ( or maybe a scientific method of ) putting his finger on the lies behind politics but our Des Res is a committed political liar and chancer who resents political lies being exposed. Today Dominic Lawson has cleverly commented on Huhne that politicians can often risk all on a lie and face it out to the end with dire consequences.

    Des Res’s political instincts are Tyrannosaurus Rex while Craig’s political DNA seems to me consistently human. I believe as a Muslim that we should follow neither trickery nor emotions but rather Allah’s guidance from the Qur’an and Sunnah.

  143. http://imaginepeace.com/archives/19347

    Yoko Ono Lennon Presents 2013 Courage Award to Julian Assange (in absentia) in New York City

    Daniel Ellsberg: “Julian Assange richly deserves this award. I hope that this award will give the Nobel Committee the courage to award Bradley Manning and Julian Assange the Nobel Peace Prize.”

    Interesting observation by Ellsberg. I myself had suggested that Julian be awarded the Nobel Prize. Far more richly observed than Obama’s, it would also encourage a resolution to his being entrapped in London despite his political asylum.

    Congratulations Julian! This is a bigger deal than Bob Dylan being awarded the ‘Medal of Freedom’–i wonder if he pins it on proudly every morning.

  144. Oh dear. You know that the credibility of your justice system has reached just about zero when Belarus starts criticising you on it!

    http://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/sverige-sagas–av-vitryssland

    http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/article16181317.ab

    (and says your treatment of Julian Assange violates international law too)

    Oh, hahahahahahahhahahhahahha

  145. What makes racists like English Knight (assuming EK is not a Zionist Troll) so very dangerous is that their agenda is inadvertenly advanced by reports such as this;

    http://nation.time.com/2013/02/04/just-who-do-they-represent-at-hagel-hearing-concern-for-israel-tops-u-s-troops-in-combat/#ixzz2Jwx9nOKk

  146. @ Karel ’23h26 on 4 Feb):

    Buon giorno Charley boy, vero maestro dei maestri! Well, at least Resident Dissident, unlike some other posters, contributes to the discussion, albeit not in the way the “community” always likes. Substance rather than huffin’ and puffin’.

  147. @ Doug Scorgie (23h40 on 4 Feb):

    “”…I do not support the Assad regime but for some reason you don’t like me to say that.”

    On the contrary, dear boy! I just wondered why you had to wait until Resident Dissident squeezed it out of you. After all, you could have mentioned your apparent dislike of the Assad regime during one of your frenzied posts about the wickedness of the Syrian rebels and their western backers. God knows you posted enough.

    On a lighter note,

    “Resident Dissident couldn’t squeeze the juice out od a soft orange”

    Perhaps not, but he certainly managed with you, which perhaps makes you an over-ripe gripe (sorry, I meant grape).

  148. And now for the last of my respected friends, David (23h59 on 4 Feb)!

    Well Davy, I’m not sure why I should let you set the agenda or the running order for our discussions: since they featured in the same post, I think we could manage to discuss, in parallel, the question of colonialism/liberal intervention and the questions of the credentials of M. Louis and Mr Max Keiser and your own credentials (you’ll remember that you characterised them as “good”).

    You might also remember that I queried your assertion that liberal intervention was just modern colonialism. It seems to me that the ball is in your court for the moment since you are the origin of the assertion, and therefore I now look forward to some reasoned argument (with as much detail and as many examples as seem fit)from you to give some substance to your claim.

  149. I noticed that Resident Dissident has descended to the depths. He/she gave me an attribution which would offend those of the Christian faith. I have never called people on here by anything other their name. Furthermore, I never said he/she was a sock puppet but merely asked if there were any here hiding under other names. If the cap fits, though, he/can wear it.

  150. @ Arbed :

    “You know that the credibility of your justice system has reached just about zero when Belarus starts criticising you on it”

    There are no doubt many reasonable arguments one could put forward to question the credibility of the UK justice system, but I hardly think that criticism from Belarus is one of them.

    But I suppose the comment was made as a joke, so I’ll be indulgent.

  151. @ Mary (12h25)

    “I never said he/she was a sock puppet but merely asked if there were any hiding under other names”

    Pull the other one and don’t take us for idiots, Mary!

    Your little dig about people hiding under other names was posted in the context of remarks from Resident Dissident which I imagine displeased you. Thus it seems clear to me that you were talking about Resident Dissident. And since people hiding under other names are sock puppets, you in effect accusezd him of being one.

    RE, the “Vrigin Mary” crack, well, I’m a believing and practicing Christian (Catholic actually, and you can’t get more Christian than that) and I don’t feel offended at all.

    Just for info, I did however feel offended when you made that crack about farewells to Hillary Clinton and the death of the security guard at the US embassy in Ankara.

  152. habby

    “You might also remember that I queried your assertion that liberal intervention was just modern colonialism.”

    I wouldn’t argue that. As I’ve said previously, colonialism and liberal intervention are both means to an end. I’d agree that liberal intervention is more sophisticated in the sense that as a phrase it may appear, to the unwary of course, to also describe the ends to which the means are put. But still, I’d argue that colonialism had similar objectives to what is now termed liberal intervention, namely the exploitation of and/or control of the resources of another people, including strategic control to similar purposes.

    I understand that you say you’re disagreeing with this statement, but I’d be most grateful if you could say why, and in more substantive terms than you’ve done to date.

    I’m sure you’ll agree it’s important to see precisely where that disagreement lies, before we can make further progress.

  153. Chew your boots, won’t you Habbabkuk or go for a good run.

  154. habby

    You say you’re a “practicing Christian (Catholic actually, and you can’t get more Christian than that)”

    What exactly does it mean to be a practicing Christian and why do you think Catholics are more Christian than other Christians?

    Thanks!

  155. President Assad has been fighting the Iraq death squads for more than 2 years now. These are the same death squads that murdered hundreds of families in Iraq and two Iraq doctors known to me who saved children’s lives in the Al Kadhmiya Hospital for Children.

    Ahmad Mouaz Al-Khatib Al-Hasani the leader of the terrorist opposition in Syria has called on the US to reconsider its 2012 decision to list the foreign and Syrian fighters of the Al-Nusra Front, as a foreign terrorist organization.

    Jabhat al-Nusra is an alias of al-Qaeda in Iraq and since November 2011 the group has claimed responsibility for “nearly 600 terrorist attacks, killing and wounding hundreds of Syrians.”

    http://english.al-akhbar.com/node/14867

    http://www.islamicinvitationturkey.com/2013/01/13/israeli-projects-implementer-al-nusra-front-saudi-made-with-lebanese-assistance/

    al-Nusra Atrocities

    Damascus Bombing – 23 December 2011
    44 civilians were killed and 166 were wounded

    al-Midan bombings – January 2012
    “martyrdom-seeking operation” Two children murdered by shrapnel

    Damascus bombings – 10 May 2012 Bombings
    A mother and four children murdered

    Deir ez-Zor killings – 29 May 2012
    A mass execution -13 men had been discovered shot to death execution-style

    TV station attack- 27 June 2012
    Seven people were killed in the attack on Al-Ikhbariya TV, including four guards and three journalists

    Mohammed al-Saeed murder – at Saadallah Al-Jabiri Square – 3 October 2012
    Mohammed al-Saeed, a well-known government TV news presenter EXECUTED

    Aleppo bombings – 3 October 2012
    Three suicide car bombs exploded at the eastern corner of the central Saadallah Al-Jabiri Square killing 48 civilians and heavily injured 122 including a 3yrs old girl who lost limbs.

    Base attacks – Aleppo – 12 October 2012
    Storming of the Hanano barracks 11 government soldiers were killed. Raid on the Raqqah base killing 32 soldiers. Taftanaz military airport – 2nd November 2012 attack-13 civilian workers murdered.

    Saraqeb executions – end October 2012
    “Assad dogs” summarily executed – UN War Crime

    car and suicide bombing – Early November 2012
    Sahl al-Ghab in Hama province – car bomb – 2 retired senior citizens killed – Mezzeh neighbourhood of Damascus suicide bomber killed3 women including a baby in carrying cot + 8 civilians.

    Aleppo “no-fly-zone” – 23 December 2012
    al-Nusra Front had declared a “no-fly-zone” over Aleppo warning civilians not to travel by air.

    I cannot understand why posters here are prepared to engage with abettors who are pushing for the demise of President Assad(the son). This indomitable, lion-hearted man is fighting deceptive Israeli and Western terrorism that is intent on civil war dividing religious groups thus furthering the war of terror by establishing long term enemies to keep NATO in business. Fools!!

  156. @ Habbabkuk 12.39pm

    “There are no doubt many reasonable arguments one could put forward to question the credibility of the UK justice system, but I hardly think that criticism from Belarus is one of them.

    But I suppose the comment was made as a joke, so I’ll be indulgent.”

    Wrong country, Habbabkuk. Did you look at the links?

    http://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/sverige-sagas–av-vitryssland

    http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/article16181317.ab

    But, yes, I am highly amused by the Swedish judicial system being criticised by Belarus – of all places – and thought I’d share the joke with peeps here. This hasn’t been reported anywhere other than Sweden, so I guess these Swedish journalists picked up on it because they felt that Lukashenko’s criticisms would resonate with their readership somehow.

  157. Knight Night

    5 Feb, 2013 - 2:53 pm

    So Zionist Provocateur Troll “English Knight” doesn’t like the Pro Palestinian Gerald Kaufman. What a surprise.

  158. resident dissident

    5 Feb, 2013 - 3:23 pm

    Mary rest assured that if there was any insult that it was aimed at you rather than the Virgin Mary or Christians in general. Given that you are notoriously free in passing out your own insults to all and sundry – perhaps you be a little more thick skinned when you get one coming back in your own direction. Similarly my intention was not to insult Jesus Christ and John the Baptist, or Old Testament prophets for that matter – but to show how your cult had assigned similar status, based on faith rather than reason, to its heroes. Just as was the case with Salman Rushdie my comment was on human behaviour closer to home rather than the spiritual type (which being agnostic I have some doubt as to its existence but wouldn’t want to deny may exist). I’m sure any Satanists out there will be able to take all this in their stride!

    Habbakkuk many thanks for your support – remember that we are the 99% outside in the real world.

    As for those with an interest in my origins I am more than happy to confirm my deep Yorkshire Methodist and Chartist roots – although I did have a 2x great aunt who married the son of a Jew who fled from the Russian pogroms. Quite obviously all members of cult assume that all who disagree must be working for Israel/USA/the Satan of the Week – because their work is so important. But difficult as it may be to understand there are some of us out here who are none of those things and just disagree based on our own free will. I’m afraid we just see the paranoia as somewhat comical.

  159. resident dissident

    5 Feb, 2013 - 3:32 pm

    @Mark Golding

    “This indomitable, lion-hearted man” – I know you are only parroting the words of Galloway in respect of one of your past heroes and following cult orders – but you should be aware that even the Gorgeous one got a little miffed when you friend stated lobbing shells into a local Palestinian refugee camp.

  160. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    5 Feb, 2013 - 3:44 pm

    This newly released 16-page doc is the legal basis of disavowing 5th amendment rights for American citizens, much less Australian citizens, and droning out their existence.

    Why, NBC can plaster their water-mark all over it is not explained.

    Basically; bullshite, bullshite, AUMF, bullshit, crapola, Supreme Court and Hamdi…….AUMF, etc……

    http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/sections/news/020413_DOJ_White_Paper.pdf

  161. Ben Franklin -Machine Gun Preacher (unleaded version)

    5 Feb, 2013 - 3:47 pm

  162. So good to hear we have so many preachers here sharing their personal sources of indoctrinated rubbish with us.

    After three hours of heavy muck spreading in the garden, one is confronted with more shit than you can wave a stick at or can handle, here, by the son of wandering jester and Ms. Dissi., our frequenting resident.

    And here comes the good news from Argentina, Yes they can take part in the next Football world cup and NO, there will be not a single Falklander amongst them, unless of course….

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/feb/05/falklands-under-our-control-argentina

  163. doug scorgie

    5 Feb, 2013 - 3:59 pm

    Habbabkuk
    4 Feb, 2013 – 9:45 pm

    @ Clark and Doug Scorgie : of course they do! Where have you been for the last 20 years – hibernating?? Don’t you read political memoirs and diaries???

    I replied:
    No I don’t, but please direct me to those that refer specifically to the use of behavioural psychologists and I will.

    Why have you not directed me (and others) to the political memoirs and diaries you refer to? Is it because you don’t know of any and you just made it up?

    I ask again direct me to the books you refer to.

    I call your bluff.

  164. “I call your bluff”

    I enjoyed that one a lot. Swords or pistols at 6?

    BTW – a point of logic – why should I direct you towards works which you proudly claim not to read? And since when have you lot ever told me where your sources are when I’ve asked? Get reading yourself, and “seek and ye shall find”.

  165. @ Arbed : whatever the country, I think I’d have the same reaction to criticism emanating from Belarus.

  166. @ David

    you’re still talking in rather general terms. Specific examples, please, in particular for the “objectives” of some of the recent “liberal interventions” (please specify the precise objectives – eg what ressorces are we talking about- and the liberal interventions you have in mind (countries concerned).

    And could you please deal with the “qualifications” questions I put to you (cf your posts about the “goodness” of Messrs Louis and Keiser) and which still remain outstanding.

    Many thanks!

  167. I do not pretend or lay claim ‘Resident dissident’ that the Syrian regime is faultless. There exists a dark side in every administration. An authoritarian character, a police state mentality and above all, deep-seated corruption.

    Syria is curiously exacerbated by the regime’s neo-liberal turn with its attendant privatisations; substituting state property for private ownership by foreign states to exploit investment and trade.

    However the one-eyed man is king and we are all blind. Foreign fighters infiltrate Syrian refugee camps because people make good human shields.

    Bashar al-Assad has been left standing as the last Arab leader not to be in the pocket of the West. Syria is hated by Western allies for refusing to sign a surrender peace with Israel, refusing to abandon its territory on the Golan to the illegal occupiers, refusing to abandon the Palestinian resistance and continuing to provide safe haven for Palestinian leaders, fighters and organisations. Syria has insisted on supporting the Lebanese resistance, has refused to allow its territory to be used as a base against the resistance in Iraq… I can go on but the facts are clear to the 99% lamenting the murder, maiming and orphaning of a million children in Iraq -on a lie and awakened by the aftermath, the total destruction left by the West and their compradors in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine.

  168. “Bashar al-Assad has been left standing as the last Arab leader not to be in the pocket of the West”

    Ah ha, there we have it. These pseudo-democrats, lovers of the truth, and true enemies of repression and friends of freedom are so stupid that they can’t help condemning themselves out of their own mouths.

    To decypher the above quotation from Mark Golding:

    Assad the Son is against the west and Israel. Therefore whatever he does is good and when it is bad it must be overlooked because were it not for the west and Usrael he would not be bad.

    What a sad imbecile. But, as Resident Dissident correctly points out, one of the 1%.

  169. Habbabkuk, I have some straightforward questions for you. Would you be prepared to answer them for me please?

  170. Habbabkuk, I see from the next thread that you have gone to have dinner. Another time, then.

  171. Thanks John. Your poem was equally moving. You have obviously seen this photo which sends shudders through me each and every time I happen upon it. I am so glad that Ali found a girlfriend and got married. Hopefully his own children will live their lives unaffected by the many clones of Bush and Bliar.

    Anthony Charles Lynton Blair due on trial in the Hague
    David Halpin
    http://www.uruknet.info/?p=44102

    Strange that the only link to his marriage that I could find was in the Sun who of course carried the war for Bliar.
    http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/4715418/ali-abbas-wedding-iraq.html

  172. resident dissident

    5 Feb, 2013 - 9:16 pm

    “resident dissident, if you were in Assange’s position, would you feel safe from establishment persecution for your Wikileaks work in submitting yourself to custody?”

    I would behave with absolute probity and be very careful not to give my tormentors any excuse to prosecute me – all of which Assange failed to do. Also if I was charged with rape I would want to go to court to clear my name. Assange’s problem is that he does not have a clear idea of what laws are legitimate and those which are not.

  173. resident dissident, I see, but would you feel safe from establishment persecution for your Wikileaks work in submitting yourself to custody?

  174. resident dissident

    5 Feb, 2013 - 9:53 pm

    Clark

    You talk as if this is a new issue – but it isn’t. You forget that most of our reforms in this country were won by people taking on and standing up to the establishment – yes of course those brave people were scared but they had the courage of their convictions to stand up for what they believe is right. They won through despite the system and very important and valuable changes were made to the legal system as a result. I’m afraid I don’t find running and hiding from rape allegations consistent with that behaviour and quite frankly it is something of an insult to those who achieved the reforms to legal systems the hard way. Similarly, I don’t have a lot of time who pooh pooh our hard earned democratic institutions as a barrier to change rather than trying to use the ones that we have. Some idiot said that it was Craig who had the old fashioned political values – all I can say is that most of these values were handed down to me by grandfather, who also passed on the other old fashioned belief that fighting fascism wherever and whenever it occurs is what socialists do.

  175. resident dissident, you talk like someone who wants to discredit Assange.

    You wrote: “would behave with absolute probity”, which Assange did, right up to the point of no return, where he would have had to surrender his freedom.

    You wrote: “if I was charged with rape I would want to go to court to clear my name”, as if Assange does not. Yet he has repeatedly stated that he does, but that first he requires protection from unrelated charges.

    You wrote “Assange’s problem is that he does not have a clear idea of what laws are legitimate and those which are not”, which is simply a slur.

    Assange has been very open and public. You post anonymously under a pseudonym. I respect Assange. You behave like a dishonest coward.

  176. resident dissident

    5 Feb, 2013 - 10:39 pm

    Clark

    I think Assange has discredited himself

    Do you really believe Assange’s behaviour with those women amounted to absolute probity? Even if belive it was legal – it certainly wasn’t honest, moral or decent in my book – which is the normal meaning of that word.

    I don’t think the comment you refer to is a slur – my not facing the music on the rape charge i think he failing to answer the case against him on a legitimate law. I also think that arguing that I might be charged on some other matter (he hasn’t to date – and asking any decent legal system to grant immunity on such a basis is quite frankly ridiculous) which he doesn’t think he should be charged for (and may well be inappropriate) is not a particularly convincing excuse. On the other hand if you want to say that Assange having a different view from my own on whether he should answer the case against for rape (which I view as legitimate law) is a slur – then please feel free.

    I have very good reasons for protecting my identity – especially on forums such as these – perhaps you should also not that in the past Assange and Wikileaks recognised that such legitimate reasons exist. Despite the countless accusations I always speak for myself and don’t play any silly sock puppet games. If Assange thinks I have libelled him – then I’m sure he is more than capable of issuing the writ.

  177. Of course the Libyan peoples stomached destruction, war, suffering and death, when the solution to the conflict could have been secured by peaceful means.

    The fabricated takeover of Tripoli’s Green Plaza fabricated and filmed in Qatar and disseminated by international mainstream media outlets, successfully secured recognition of the NATO-backed National Transition Council (CNT) as the ‘new government in Libya’ and convinced many Libyan embassy staff abroad to defect.

    NATO allies launched over 20,000 sorties over Libya, carrying out an estimated 9,000 air strikes that murdered 30,000 civilians.

    Russia and China and most of the world knew that UKUSIS axis of imperialism had sown together a new format for imperial aggression’ by using the hegemonic international media to demonize governments opposed to US foreign policy.

    I reported here UK mercenaries and Saudi terrorists helped instigate revolutions of colour and revolutions of spring in countries in which imperialism claims civil liberties are restricted. Demonization followed by international media campaigns to topple anti-USUKIS governments and, if necessary, direct military intervention would follow.

    This modus of deception was of course uncloaked early from experience gained in the Iraq war and Russia and China clearly knew at the time Syria was in grave danger.

    The vetoes by China and Russia at the UN security council saved Syria and Assad from another NATO psywar. This failure to secure another ‘no-fly zone’ would lead to the next step, an invasion with Israel taking the lead role.

    Such an invasion would be justified in the Western press on the concocted pretext that Syria’s chemical weapons must be secured before they fall into the wrong hands in the chaotic aftermath of a post-Assad Syria.

    The plot was preempted by intelligence and the anti-Assad fundamentalist terrorists, who have been caught committing massacres as well as faking them to blame Assad for propaganda purposes, found themselves on the same side as the arch foe of the region, Israel.

    Frustrated Israel would later strike a Syrian Scientific Studies and Research complex, a dual purpose small strike package that was expected to uncover chemical and biological weapons and test Syrian air-defense for a later major incursion by a COVERT joint Israeli/NATO strike force UNDER COVER OF DARKNESS.

  178. “Russia and China and most of the world knew that UKUSIS axis of imperialism had sown together a new format for imperial aggression”

    An apt article by DIANA JOHNSTONE;

    http://warisacrime.org/content/good-intentions-pave-road-war

  179. Resident Dissident, 10.39am

    “Do you really believe Assange’s behaviour with those women amounted to absolute probity? Even if belive it was legal – it certainly wasn’t honest, moral or decent in my book”

    Are you male or female? If the former, have you ever slept with two different women – willing partners and fully consenting, that is – within the same week? Because it’s abundantly clear from the women’s own statements to the police that that’s all Assange did.

    If you’re female, have you ever had the misfortune to find out that a man has two-timed you in this way? Did you report him to the police for it?

    Final question, as you have such strict standards of probity, are you Victorian?

  180. resident dissident, ah, so by “absolute probity”, you mean that Assange should have conformed to your code of sexual exclusivity, rather than that chosen by the participants, who all knew of each other’s interests, and indeed facilitated them. Either that, or you are presuming guilt based upon the women’s statements as interpreted by the second prosecutor.

    I was referring to Assange’s probity in dealing with the law enforcement agencies.

    You “don’t think the comment [...] is a slur”, but I already suspect your honesty; let’s look at it again:

    “Assange’s problem is that he does not have a clear idea of what laws are legitimate and those which are not”

    You are saying that Assange does not respect laws of sexual consent, which is a slur and again, a presumption of guilt. You have again established your own dishonesty.

    “asking any decent legal system to grant immunity on such a basis is quite frankly ridiculous” [my emphasis]

    No, he’s asking a political system to grant him immunity from a political charge; again, you misrepresent.

    “I have very good reasons for protecting my identity – especially on forums such as these – perhaps you should also…” [my emphasis]

    Ah. A veiled threat, and from behind a mask, too. Really, you should be ashamed of yourself.

  181. As you say Macky, a succinct and pertinent post by two humanitarian warriors, Diana Johnstone and close friend David Swanson. Fine chap. Solid, trustworthy.

  182. English Knight

    6 Feb, 2013 - 12:43 am

    Huffpo is a sayanim love fest. Discuss . PS – I make no apologies for throwing the first punch, but there are resident Albrights (and Kerrys too) to parry in this blog.

  183. Resident Dissident, I fear your logical conclusions regarding JA will fall on deaf ears around here. Much like Hiroo Onoda, the vanguard on here will refute any evidence presented that compromises JA ,and viciously attack anyone who has the temerity to criticise him. . Despite the futility of their fight and the fact that any reasoned individual can see that the emperor is wearing no clothes, they have invested too much of themselves in ‘JA the Brand’, and to face the uncomfortable truth now would compromise their whole belief system.

    Whilst every man and his dog on plant earth can see that JA is an utterly discredited, bail-skipping, self-promoting, hypocritical liar , the last remaining defenders would have us believe he is bravely fighting for truth and freedom at the same time as being holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy so that he escape the forces of justice and avoid due process from a serious sexual crime? Pass me the sick bag.

  184. Mark Golding,

    you blithely state that “NATO allies launched over 20,000 sorties over Libya, carrying out an estimated 9,000 air strikes that murdered 30,000 civilians.”

    Do you have a scintilla of evidence to back up your figure of 30,000, or is this a complete fabrication to lend credence to your argument?

  185. 993964 471267Aw, it was a genuinely very good post. In concept I ought to put in writing related to this furthermore – spending time and actual effort to manufacture a exceptional article

  186. CE, 6 Feb, 3:30 am

    “I fear your logical conclusions regarding JA will fall on deaf ears around here. [...] any reasoned individual [blah blah blah - my edit]“

    And yet you present no logical argument whatsoever, and instead issue empty rhetoric.

    You also previously demonstrated that you couldn’t care less about at least one of the women involved, and that for the likes of you it’s all just good material towards your persecution of Assange. “Sick bag”? Indeed.

  187. resident dissident

    6 Feb, 2013 - 10:51 am

    “resident dissident, ah, so by “absolute probity”, you mean that Assange should have conformed to your code of sexual exclusivity, rather than that chosen by the participants, who all knew of each other’s interests, and indeed facilitated them. “

    Well of course any view about probity, which relates to what is moral and decent, is an individual view. But I’m fairly comfortable in asserting that most of society would share my stance – and even one of your cult members Gorgeous George has now backed down and admitted that Assange’s behavior although in his view was completely legal was someway short of being desirable.
    I could of course cite other elements of Assange’s behavior which fall well below my view of what constitutes probity e.g his taking the Putin shilling by working for Russia Today, Putin of course being famous for his openness and defence of press freedoms, or his vomit inducing interview with Nasrallah on RT.

    “You are saying that Assange does not respect laws of sexual consent, which is a slur and again, a presumption of guilt. You have again established your own dishonesty.”

    This is a ridiculous statement – I have been very careful not to make an assumption of guilty. What I have said that when a decent legal system believes that there is a case to answer on the question of rape (and all the evidence is that legal authorities in the West only seek to prosecute a very small proportion of actual rape cases) then a decent person would at least seek to answer that case through the courts. It would be totally stupid to argue that presumption of innocence means that you have the freedom to pick and chose whether or not you wish to appear in court to answer a case against you – otherwise I suspect everyone would use that argument to avoid justice.

    “No, he’s asking a political system to grant him immunity from a political charge; again, you misrepresent.”

    What you fail to understand that decent legal systems try and resist interference from politicians – and that decent politicians avoid interfering in said legal systems. It happens too much even in the West and is of course the norm in the regimes you often seek to defend.

    “I have very good reasons for protecting my identity – especially on forums such as these – perhaps you should also…” [my emphasis]
    “Ah. A veiled threat, and from behind a mask, too. Really, you should be ashamed of yourself.”

    And you have the nerve to call me dishonest – could you please look at the words I said after the italics – all I was saying is that Assange and Wikileaks have also in the past recognized the need to project the anonymity of their sources (although of course in Assange’s case it was reported by Luke Harding that he said that such anonymity should be applied to informants in Afghanistan who supplied information to the US, who he believed should be shot). There was no threat veiled or otherwise – and I look forward to an apology for your selective misquoting to infer that there was.

  188. resident dissident, I see no reason to apologise for your dishonesty and misrepresentation, of which you have just produced further examples. Let’s take the most blatant one first:

    “perhaps you should also not that in the past Assange and Wikileaks recognised that such legitimate reasons exist.”

    “all I was saying is that Assange and Wikileaks have also in the past recognized the need to project the anonymity of their sources”

    You really just don’t care, do you? Just twist it in whatever direction serves your ends at the time. You’re a disgrace.

    “What you fail to understand that decent legal systems try and resist interference from politicians – and that decent politicians avoid interfering in said legal systems. It happens too much even in the West and is of course the norm in the regimes you often seek to defend.”

    Oh I understand the importance separation of politics and justice. But extradition inherently straddles that boundary, as it involves the passing of a prisoner from one set of laws produced by one government to a set of laws produced by a different government. Assange has repeatedly stated that he will present himself to Sweden once he has a political assurance that he won’t be sent elsewhere at the behest of the USA. Why do you continue to ignore this?

    Your above paragraph also includes a misrepresentation of myself: “the regimes you often seek to defend”. Which “regimes”, and where have I defended them? All comments on this blog can be linked to individually.

    You do like to repeat the word “rape”, don’t you? It invokes the kind of feelings you wish people to associate with Assange, and thus suits your defamation campaign. You make no mention of the various distinctions within Swedish law which are absent in that single word. By doing so, you debase the term itself, doing a disservice to all who have suffered sexual compulsion, and all yet to suffer so.

    For decades we have campaigned to get rapists caught, charged and convicted. But the pursuit of Assange is political

    Katrin Axelsson and Lisa Longstaff
    guardian.co.uk, Thursday 23 August 2012 09.00 BST

    When Julian Assange was first arrested, we were struck by the unusual zeal with which he was being pursued for rape allegations.

    It seems even clearer now, that the allegations against him are a smokescreen behind which a number of governments are trying to clamp down on WikiLeaks for having audaciously revealed to the public their secret planning of wars and occupations with their attendant rape, murder and destruction.

    Justice for an accused rapist does not deny justice for his accusers. But in this case justice is being denied both to accusers and accused.

    http://womenagainstrape.net/inthemedia/we-are-women-against-rape-we-do-not-want-julian-as

    Yes, “unusual zeal”. That’s just what I see from you and CE. Hypocrisy, dishonesty, and a load of hot air.

  189. resident dissident, go on, then, clarify. Exactly why should I “protect my identity”, as you apparently need to? Neither of us is a “source”. We merely argue over publicly available evidence.

  190. I should correct an inaccuracy in the passage that I quoted above:

    “But in this case justice is being denied both to accusers and accused.”

    In this case, the accuser is the second prosecutor in Sweden, notably a more politically connected prosecutor than the first, who dropped the case.

  191. “Just twist it in whatever direction serves your ends at the time. You’re a disgrace.”

    Ditto Habbabkuk & CE; but did you really expect anything different ?

    These trolls cannot engage in honest rational debate because their mission is to troll; and even if not deliberate trolls with an agenda, but simply not very bright individuals, they end up behaving exactly like trolls, as by definition it’s impossible to defend the indefensible (ie their “views”) . Although it’s best to simply ignore such trolls, each poster has to experience each troll’s dishonesty for themselves, both to obtain the troll realization, & after all, even trolls deserve one chance from everybody.

    I understand the temptation to respond to a particularly provocative troll post, and there is nothing wrong in delivering a short response, but to play their game more than the initial once, by engaging in a prolong “debate”, is why this saying exist: “fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me”.

  192. Resident Dissident, 10.51am

    “in Assange’s case it was reported by Luke Harding that he said that such anonymity should be applied to informants in Afghanistan who supplied information to the US, who he believed should be shot)”

    Resident Dissident, you are wilfully ignoring the fact that I have already posted here in this very thread a pdf signed witness statement from an independent journalist totally refuting that Assange ever said the remark which Luke Harding claims.

    On the subject of the Swedish investigation, you may be interested in reading this. Yes, I wrote it (kind of – it was cobbled together from comments of mine in the Guardian which someone took from there unbeknownst to me, but to which I give my blessing ex post facto):

    http://www.marthamitchelleffect.org/#/experience-is-knowing/4571327145

    That should explain to you why I take such an interest in this case, as most women in my position do – we don’t like our trauma and pain being trivialised for political purposes. Most of us also believe that justice means applying rape laws equally and impartially to both accusers and accused, otherwise it is not justice at all, by definition.

    I didn’t write this one, but you will find attached to this article the original police forensic report on a condom handed in to police by one of the complainants in the Assange case as evidence that he deliberately tore it during sex, as she maintains in her witness statement.

    The forensic lab reports the condom – though it has a tear in it and looks ‘used’ (yes, there’s a photo) – has no DNA on it at all, neither male nor female.

    The article references the dates given on various documents within the Swedish police protocol to conclusively prove that the Swedish prosecutor already had this forensic evidence in her possession three weeks before she issued an international EAW warrant for Assange’s extradition but ignored it, in dereliction of her legal duty under Swedish law (where prosecutors are allowed the dual role of both investigator and judicial authority (some “decent legal system”, eh?)) to follow the Objectivity Rule and take mitigating evidence into account before deciding to proceed.

    http://wlcentral.org/node/2325

    So, a woman hands in fabricated physical evidence when making rape allegations to the police? Genuine rape victims don’t do that.

    And a prosecutor ignores forensic evidence already in her possession when seeking to forcibly extradite a suspect and put him in jail before either questioning or charging him? Genuine prosecutions don’t do that either.

  193. LastBlueBell

    6 Feb, 2013 - 1:07 pm

    Re Belarus v Sweden

    I dont know how well known this is internationally, but it might be of interest to divulge some of the backstory behind it.

    In the summer of 2012, a Swedish PR firm carried out a campaign in Belarus in support of the opposition and for democracy and freedom of speech. They flew over the border from the baltic states into Belarus airspace in small civilian aircrafts, and dropped several hundred teddy bears with pro democracy messages attached.

    In reaction to this, Belarus declared the Swedish ambassador a persona non grata, and acused him of contacts with the opposition, and Sweden in turn declared that the newly appointed Belarus amabassador was not welcome to Sweden, and two other Belarus representatives were expelled.

    As far as I know several people in Belarus has then been arrested, tried and sentenced in conjuction to the action, and Belarus KGB requested that the representatives for the PR firm come to Minsk for “questioning”, and promised a fair and leagally secure handling of their case.

    To the point, it can also be noted that the PR firm meticulously recorded everything they did, including illegally crossing into Belarus airspace.

    So I think it is conducive to view the references to Assange in the light of this, and in the context of the ongoing dispute between Belarus and Sweden.

  194. @ LastBlueBell, 1.07pm

    Yes, I did know about the international spat between Sweden and Belarus over the teddy bears incident. Presumably, some Swedish politicians have made public remarks about the merits of Belarus’s extradition request. It would be very interesting for readers of Craig’s blog if you could post some of these – if you have links for them – so we can see how they compare with statements made by Swedish and/or UK/EU/US politicians about the merits of extradition in Julian Assange’s case.

    Any chance?

  195. LastBlueBell, thanks, that’s very interesting.

    “In the summer of 2012, a Swedish PR firm carried out a campaign in Belarus in support of the opposition and for democracy and freedom of speech.”

    Hmm. A PR firm wouldn’t do this spontaneously. Do you know who had hired them? Why a Swedish firm, I wonder?

    “the PR firm meticulously recorded everything they did, including illegally crossing into Belarus airspace”

    So the PR firm must be expecting some sort of political support; some state or country must have offered them some kind of legal cover, so long as they acted within certain parameters.

    Teddy bears. Cuddly-toy political stand-ins, or something. What a weird and fascinating story.

  196. resident dissident

    6 Feb, 2013 - 2:20 pm

    Clark
    I am still due an apology for you quoting my words out of context to imply that I was threatening you – I think you may not have recognized that in the first of your quotes there is was a pretty obvious type since the “not” you have italicized should be “note” – rather than you trying to again abuse what I said to infer that I had changed my position.
    On extradition you fail to recognize that as many Swedes have repeatedly pointed out their system does allow their politicians to say how the legal system might be used in the future to handle charges and requests for extradition that have not yet arisen – and nor should it. How the Swedish legal system would respond in such a situation would be dependent on what the charges were, how supportable they were and the current arrangements for reviewing such requests in Sweden including any multilateral and bilateral treaties that are in force with other countries. If there were countless tails of Sweden extraditing people to other countries without due process – believe me your lot would have already provided voluminous details. We also now know that for Assange to be extradited he would also have to meet the legal conditions of the UK – which based on recent legal cases most people will acknowledge as being pretty rigorous ( I appreciate that many members of the cult will not share this view – but then they wouldn’t want to extradite anyone who shared their political views whatever their crime)
    You do like to repeat the word “rape”, don’t you? Not really – in fact you appear to use the word rather more often than I do. But it is a serious crime and it is what Assange is being accused of. If it was common assault I would feel pretty much the same. Yes you are right that Swedish Law distinguishes between different types of rape – but as far as I can see they all amount to different forms of assault rather than “sexual compulsion” as you euphemistically call it.
    I could just as easily point/link to others who argue that the pursuit of Assange on this matter is not political – and if you think I haven’t seen the arguments you are just being naïve. I just don’t agree with them for some of the reasons I have already mentioned – and I daresay the cult is aware of some more which they believe have already addressed. Judgements and views are made on the subject – mine differs from yours, and however much you shout and scream and throw petty insults I just do not find your arguments convincing without the provision of some rather more convincing evidence on your part. The conspiracy may be obvious to you – but it isn’t to me. Your past record does indicate that you tend to see the US behind most of the evil in this world doesn’t it?
    As for reasons for confidentiality – there are many and they depend on different circumstances. Mine include the following:
    - my day to day work is far removed from the political sphere – and believe it or not having publicly held strong political views such as my own would not go down too well
    - If my identity became known then many islamofascists and other political nutters would invade by personal privacy at home which I share with my family, I have already seen attempts to send nasty viruses to my PC from some sites which I have visited and where I have left comments
    - Given that there are many like yourself who are prepared to respond with personal abuse to my own views – I guess that knowing my personal details the temptation to up the stakes would be irresistible – my guess is that in your role as moderator you have already looked up my IP address etc with goodness knows what purpose in mind.
    Anyway until you apologise and start to show a bit of maturity and recognize that it is possible to have genuine differences of opinion based on how people see the world rather than whether they are good or evil – please do not bother continuing this dialogue. Until now I have been polite and tried to answer your questions – but as CE has pointed out my politeness is probably not worth the effort.

  197. resident dissident

    6 Feb, 2013 - 2:37 pm

    “Resident Dissident, you are wilfully ignoring the fact that I have already posted here in this very thread a pdf signed witness statement from an independent journalist totally refuting that Assange ever said the remark which Luke Harding claims.”

    No I’m not wilfully ignoring the fact – because believe it or not I don’t follow all your threads, especially those in Swedish. In fact I have probably only looked at 2 or 3.

    Luke Harding stands by the statement. Luke Harding is a brave man who consistently stands up for press freedom and against Putin – which is considerably more than your hero and probably the independent journalist to which you refer. Did Luke Harding ever say that said journalist was present when the remark was made – if not an affadvit saying that Assange never said the words quoted would be pretty meaningless.

    I believe that the right place for the evidence to be considered and judged in this case is in Court and I have a lot of faith that this would happen. Assange is currently innocent and there is no need to try and prove this to me by what may or may not be evidence for the defence and would then be examined by skilled prosecutors or the judge. Blogs and the internet are pretty useless for that purpose. I’m not sure that you understand that because there is uncertainty in this world the roles of defence, prosection and judge need to be separated – the only people who are certain of everything are usually fools.

  198. resident dissident

    6 Feb, 2013 - 2:51 pm

    Macky

    Yes of course my views and those of my fellow trolls are indefensible, since of course the views of the cult are the correct and have been demonstrated as being so to the faithful time and time again. Other views can therefore be ignored and rubbished and those expressing them can be ignored as they are the work of the Devil, Lucifer and Beelzebub. You are certain in your views (nay substantiated facts), since they are righteous.

    Jeez – and to think those on the left used to believe in dialectical argument.

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