I have been trying for the last few days to discover a coherent logic towards my feelings on man’s relationship with his environment. This is proving not to be simple.
The process started when I heard on World Service radio a gentleman from the International Panel on Climate Change discussing their latest report. As you know, I tend to accept the established opinion on climate change, and rather take the view that if all our industrial activity were not affecting the atmosphere, that would be strange.
But what struck me was that the gentleman said that a pause in warming for the last fifteen years was not significant, as fifteen years was a blip in processes that last over millennia.
Well, that would certainly be very true if you are considering natural climate change. But we are not – we are considering man-made climate change. In terms of the period in which the scale of man’s industrial activity has been having a significant impact on the environment, surely fifteen years is a pretty important percentage of that period? Especially as you might naturally imagine the process to be cumulative – fifteen years at the start when nothing much happened would be more explicable.
Having tucked away that doubt, I started to try to think deeper. Man is, of course, himself a part of nature. Anything man does on this planet is natural to this planet. I do not take the view man should not change his environment – otherwise I should not be sitting in a house. The question is rather, are we inadvertently making changes to the environment to our own long term detriment?
That rejection of what you might call the Gaia principle – that the environmental status quo is an end in itself – has ramifications. It is hard to conceptualise our relationship with gases or soil, but easier in terms of animals. I am not a vegetarian – I am quite happy that we farm and eat cattle, for example – and you might argue that the cattle are pretty successful themselves, symbiotic survivors of a kind. Do I think other species have a value in themselves? Is there any harm in killing off a species of insect, other than the fact that biodiversity may be reduced in ways that remove potential future advantages to man, or there may be knock on consequences we know not of that damage man somehow? I am not quite sure, but in general I seem in practice to take the view that exploitation of other species and substantial distortion of prior ecological balance to suit men’s needs is fine, so presumably the odd extinction is fine too, unless it damages man long term.
I strongly disapprove of hurting animals for sport, and want to see them have the best quality of life possible, preferably wild. But I like to eat and wear them. I am not quite sure why it is OK to wear animal skin on our feet or carry it as a bag, but not to wear “fur”. What is the difference, other than that leather has had the hair systematically rubbed off as part of the process of making it? A trivial issue, but one that obviously relates to the deeper questions.
Yes I draw a distinction between animals which are intelligent and those which are not. I would not eat whale or dolphin. But this does not seem entirely logical – animal intelligence and sensibility is evidently a continuum. Many animals mourn, for example. The BBC World Service radio (my main contact with the outside world at present – I have just today found my very, very weak internet connection just about works if I try it at 5am) informed me a couple of days ago that orang-utans have the ability to think forward and tell others where they will be the next day. Why cattle and fish are daft enough to eat is hard to justify.
I quite appreciate the disbenefits to man of radically changing his environment, even if it could be done without long term risk to his existence – the loss of beauty, of connection to seasons and forms of behaviour with which we evolved. But I regard those as important only as losses to man, not because nature is important intrinsically. In short, if I thought higher seas, no polar bears and no glaciers would not hurt man particularly, I don’t suppose I would have much to say against it. I fear the potential repercussions are too dangerous to man. At base, I don’t actually care about a polar bear.
Jon this is the usual charge you bring, when you are not in agreement with the points arising, or wish the conversation had not taken place. This point is further corroborated in your line of questioning; A simple yes or no might suffice here, .
The points arising are many, but of course you won’t have time for any of that claptrap now would you? However let us be confused some more, if you will.
You conveniently overlook that Palestinians have no standing army, or “defence forces”*. Simply put Palestinians are all civilians and unarmed combatants** This point then renders the proposition :
A null and void proposition, but alas in the blinkered and wilfully blind world of our current “debate” this denial of facts matters not a fucking jot, does it? (whoops there I go again and become abusive and all that shit).
Further, the conspiracy of silence surrounding the give away of the land without people to the people without a land (who the hell invented this horseshit, aside) The same conspiracies have extended to the exclusion of the Palestinians as people and human beings. Thus reducing this beleaguered nation into mere “chattel” that can be dealt with, by the ziofuckwits without any impunity in law, or any consequences for the said supremacist wankers.
Further, the no arms supply for the “animals in the human guise” or “cockroaches in a bottle” has meant that there has been a siege laid to Gaza, that is further reinforced by killing, incarcerating, and maiming anyone from outside world who dares to break the siege to take medicine, or food, or material needed for the water purification, sewerage, or electricity production, into that benighted land.
This is further extended to declaring any kind of funding from without the occupied Palestine to be classified as aiding and abetting “terrorists” that in turn has meant prosecuting people for setting up charities to help the Palestinians in the West, or hounding anyone who dares to support the Palestinian cause. As is the custom even on this board with ziofuckwits running amok, and being given latitude and support to maintain such an uneven and one-sided regimen of suppression of any sort of dissent in the face of their inhumanity and barbarism.
It is now seventy years the “peace” in the occupied Palestine has been in the making and during this time, as you are aware there is a ratio of one hundred Palestinian deaths, to one zionistani death. Don’t you think this ratio is of no consequence for the ziofuckwits who are running the murder fest and the plunder based enterprise in Palestine? Why should these ziofuckwits change their methods, do they have any reason to?
Why do you think, that is not acceptable for the Palestinians to exact the same numbers of “collateral damage” as the zionistanis? What makes them so fucking special and why the rest of the world population is so inconsequential and fucking dispensable as a condom? You seem to be somewhat indignant that 100 to one ratio is good for the Palestinians and not good for the gander so to speak.
Take your time answering Jon, and write as much as you like, because I am fucking sick and tired of the “liberal” auspices that is permitting such a one sided carnage, and the political pressures that suppress even the remotest of hints of an alternative view.
Whence even stating a position becomes a crime; there can be no hope for any resolution of the situation but the destruction of the victims of the oppression and tyranny, don’t you agree?
* The lightly armed Kappo in the concentration camps are no security forces, by any stretch of imagination, they are simply an extension of the occupation forces.
** Palestinians don’t even have a fucking country, the forces of occupation have reneged on Geneva convention, but who is talking about sense at these times of tyranny, suppression and rampant injustice?
PS I am sure you will be even more
annoyedconfused because I have said nothing and written lots. That is the pattern in our transactions.Despite decades of frantic Zionist indoctrination, the Jews that matter, the ones with money, don’t give a rat’s ass about the state of Israel. The rich have no need for a homeland. They will be treated like royalty wherever they go. Israel is useful to them only as long as it continues to be a conduit for corrupt US aid and foreign military sales. That corruption allows Jewish kleptocrats to pose as agents of influence and earn unctuous stroking and cultivation from Israeli subversives. Without that status symbol, rich Jews would leave the holy land to the Palestinians and schnorrer Jews.
Israeli Nationalism is fine, for the hoi polloi who will be stuck there. You heard the same sort of nationalist blather from the Rhodies when their tenure started to stink. Then they cut their losses and upped sticks. Israelis are no different. Whatever what they say, they’ll move on when it’s to their advantage.
This is how the abuse of Palestinians rights has proliferated to become the abuse of everyone’s right, that is you and I, our rights, across the planet.
Man who set himself on fire on the National Mall ie opposite the US congress.
Then comes the discount;
The same techniques is deployed in other medjia;
Man who set himself on fire in Washington DC mall dies No mention of the congress, but a shopping centre for you and I.
Then comes the discount;
The rampant police state US has now decreed the country as free fire zone to shoot at; citizens aside, the disfranchisement of the US citizens aside. However even desperate measures to highlight the current world of shit in US is discounted as aberrations of delusional psychotic mentally ill mad persons too.
Photographic Proof that the DC Woman Rammed the Barricades!
The video of the shooting
We are all Palestinians now.
An extract on the Capitol Hill car=chase and shooting from another blog:
“US Capitol shooting We don’t want to sound callous, but our reaction when we heard the first report was to yawn and say “Boooorrrrriiiinnnngggg.” After all, in the Washington Metro area we have our share of crazies, and why should we consider ourselves special just because the government is based in the region?
As Reader Luxembourg will doubtless point out, in Chicago, his home town, senseless, bizzare, and sometimes macabre shootings take place all the time, and no one feels it merits more than a couple of lines in the national media. http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/03/us-usa-capitol-shooting-idUSBRE9920W520131003
· The entire incident seems to have been about a woman driver who decided to run security barricades in the area at high speed. The shots seem to have been all fired by police trying to stop her. The woman was killed. Anyone with a minimal IQ knows that when police tell you that you cannot cross a barricade, you ask for alternative directions and leave. You do not challenge the police in a high security area
Though admittedly this is one story about American crazies that does not involve a gun. Meaning the woman did not have one. Maybe that should be the news story. More details in CNN http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/03/politics/capitol-shots-fired-developments/index.html?hpt=hp_t1
____________
Do watch the CNN video above with the commentary. It is astounding that the woman driver wasn’t shot even earlier.
We may all be Palestinians now. But thank God not all of us are Cuckoos!
sure techC
The LAW ABIDING IDF at work today. Luisa Morgantini has also been injured but it would not bother them that she is an ex President of the EU.
Israeli forces disperse Palestinian protests across West Bank
05/10/2013 14:21
RAMALLAH (Ma’an) — Israeli forces injured dozens of Palestinian activists on Friday at demonstrations against the Israeli separation wall across the occupied West Bank.
In Bilin, west of Ramallah, six were injured and dozens suffered tear-gas inhalation as Israelis attacked demonstrations protesting the separation wall and demanding the return of village lands illegally confiscated to build the wall.
Previous protests by Bilin activists have forced the Israeli authorities to re-route the wall, but large chunks of the village lands remain inaccessible to residents because of the route.
Palestine Satellite Channel reporters Ali Dar, Salah al-Khawaja, and Mohammad Abed, 19, were struck by tear-gas canisters, while Mohammad Abdul-Fattah Burnat, 24, was shot by a rubber-coated steel bullet in the back. Luisa Morgantini, former vice president of the European Parliament, and lawmaker Mustafa Barghouthi were also among the injured.
Barghouthi said Israeli forces attacked the demonstration and fired stun grenades, tear gas and rubber-coated steel bullets widely.
He added that Israeli soldiers tried to restrict the movement of ambulances and paramedics.
Barghouthi argued that Israeli “suppression” would not break the will of Palestinians, and he added that the popular resistance along with the global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel was the way to end settlement activity and increase the steadfastness of Palestinians.
/..
Much more plus photos.
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=635948
How the Israelis keep the Palestinians (like drugged cockroaches in a bottle^)imprisoned.
Waiting in Gaza, where nothing makes sense
Yousef M. Aljamal
4 October 2013
The scene at Rafah crossing on 28 September.
(Eyad Al Baba / APA images)
It’s 1pm on 18 September at the Rafah crossing at the Gaza-Egypt border.
Hundreds of travelers — mostly students and medical patients — are waiting at the passengers’ hall at the Palestinian side of border. All of them are holding their Palestinian Authority travel documents, looking at the officer who calls the names of people who are supposed to travel the next day.
People who have the good fortune to hear their names are congratulated by fellow passengers. Dozens edge closer to the counter where the officer stands, thinking that this might help them.
The hall is getting narrower. Frustration, anger, cries, chants and tears are heard and seen everywhere. “Students! Students! Students!” chants one of the stranded students, demanding that students be given priority to travel, to the dissatisfaction of those in the hall already living and working abroad. “The crossing was open to allow students in particular to travel,” says one of the students. “We are about to lose our scholarships.”
A woman dressed in black cries, “My residency is about to expire. My boss threatened to fire me if I don’t get to my job in the United Arab Emirates in a week. Please, I am the provider for my family, allow me to travel, sir. God bless you, please.”
/..
http://electronicintifada.net/content/waiting-gaza-where-nothing-makes-sense/12827
*“WHEN WE HAVE settled the land, all the Arabs will be able to do about it will be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle.” —Rafael Eitan Israeli Army Chief of Staff April 14, 1983′
https://cryptostorm.org/viewtopic.php?f=14&p=5049#p5049
Some well-informed thoughts on secret-police attacks on privacy infrastructure – in this case, Silk Road. A bonus of taking down a Tor hidden service is promoting the ‘resistance is futile’ line. But the writer here suggests that government provocateurs used social engineering to circumvent software security that they could not crack, acting out a row between fake Hell’s Angels and a mad scientist to gain the target’s trust.
Worth bearing in mind as we watch the antics of the various clowns performing here. Consider that anything they do might be intended to elicit information for illegal surveillance. Every serious dissident has experience with probes of this sort but it’s always worth bearing in mind.
The Kirsty Wark interview of Glenn Greenwald, with a preface by
Jonathan Cook
http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2013-10-04/the-most-embarrassing-news-interview-ever/
Cheka Tricks (great name) too much to get my head round tonight.
You might like my latest article which mentions the Cheka in relation to the alleged suicide of Sergei Yesenin. Hopefully it will shut up the big-gob who refers to me as a Stalinist.
http://newsjunkiepost.com/2013/10/04/supermax-prisons-and-guantanamo-worse-than-the-gulag/
cheka tricks, here is an interesting story and the censorship to boot;
Sussex police hire hit-man
The order is to remove the photograph of the said Richard Catlyn. The page is hacked to for good measures, best get there in a hurry.
liar caught out?
‘Murdoch betrays everyone in the end’
When journalists can’t protect their sources, everyone’s worse off:
http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/8839521/war-on-whistleblowers/
Great article, Monsieur Goss. The USSR parallels hit me with increasing force. It’s as though the miasma you felt in the old Soviet bloc got released and drifted here like some contagion.
The US may have unsigned the ICC treaty, but they’re still stuck in other little snares. Mandatory review by the Human Rights Committee is held October 17-18. The government shutdown hasn’t allowed State to escape that. It will be quite the entertaining disgrace.
Fedup, that trick has a Bulgarian feel. The photo duel is priceless. I picture that simpering imbecile Catlyn in an Inspector-Clouseau style disguise.
Oh, Felt. The old vegetable got all the credit for CIA’s hard work.
http://whowhatwhy.com/2012/05/07/watergate-revelations-the-coup-against-nixon-part-1-of-3/
@Resident Dissident
You must be very desperate to believe if can’t argue with the facts so instead attack the sources.
I have presented far more evidence than enough to show that the Zionist movement contributed greatly to the financing of the Russian Revolution which to me comes as no surprise whatsoever considering the extent of the persecution of Jews in Tsarist Russia. It is pure logic that many Jews, such as Trotsky, would join the revolutionaries and that wealthy Jews abroad, such as Jacob Schiff would support it financially.
If you claim that Jacob Schiff didn’t contribute $20 million to the revolutionaries as his Grandson is quoted as saying then you come up with the evidence to support your argument.
Fred
But there are no reliable sources given and I very much doubt the facts quoted are the facts. The quote is all there is – and that on a website devoted to saying the Rothschilds were behind everything. If you bother to read proper histories then you will see that the vast majority of the finance for the Bolshevik revolution came from the German Government (who also had somtheing of a motive) – read Volkogonov who had access to the Soviet State Archives etc, Sure there were Jewish refugees from the Pogroms who offered some support – and it is well documented that Schiff helped organise the finance for the Japanese in the 1905 Russo Japanese conflict – perhaps less well know is that he left a Jewish group in New York when some of its members advocated support for the Bolsheviks. The myth that Rothschilds were behind the Russian revolution i’m afraid is just part of the same big anti-semitic lie that these racists are seeking to perpetuate.
@Resident Dissident
Where have I said that the Rothschilds were behind everything?
Are you claiming that in the February 3, 1949 issue of the New York Journal American Jacob Schiff’s Grandson wasn’t quoted as saying that his grandfather had contributed $20 million to the Russian revolutionaries? That author Edward Griffin lied about it knowing it was an easily disproved lie?
I don’t understand why you find it so hard to believe that a wealthy Zionist banker donated money to fight the oppression of the Jews in Russia when asked by one of the leaders of the revolution, Trotsky, a fellow Jew.
It all makes perfect sense to me.
Winston Churchill Illustrated Sunday Herald (February 1920)
Fred
It is also pretty well documented at that time that Trotsky was strongly opposed to Zionism while Schiff was a supporter and I think that there were also letters from Schiff to State department officials asking for support to be cut off to the Revolutionary government on the grounds that it did not represent the Russian people – all of which further undermines your story.
Fred
I think you need to understand more about the politics of the time with many people looking for scapegoats for everything that was going wrong – including the publication of the forged Protocols of Zion which clearly had some influence on Winston Churchill. And of course the modern day equivalent is also all too evident and is being pushed by various anti-semites on this blog and elsewhere.
You need to appreciate that the Jewish diaspora at the time was far from being united – there were some who supported the Herzl and his concept of Zionism, some who supported other concepts of Zionism (e.g. Poale Zion) and then some who were strongly against Zionism such as Trotsky who saw revolution as the best way forward and were opposed to Zionism.
You can of course take your evidence from the blame everything on the Rothchilds/Jews sites – unsourced though that evidence usually is (what can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence I’m afraid) – but I think you should ask yourself why no respected historian of the Russian Revolution (and there are many of differing perspectives) has ever picked up their theories as to how the Bolsheviks were funded – I am not denying that there weren’t Jewish sympathisers abroad who provided support, but they were not large scale, they were not the Rothchilds and they were not Zionists – the main funders were the German government who were keen to take Tsarist Russia out of WW1 (which is what was hidden in the Soviet state archives until 20 years ago – but I daresay the conspiracists will say that Volkogonov was just a Zionist agent).
Are you claiming that in the February 3, 1949 issue of the New York Journal American Jacob Schiff’s Grandson wasn’t quoted as saying that his grandfather had contributed $20 million to the Russian revolutionaries? That author Edward Griffin lied about it knowing it was an easily disproved lie?
So now it isn’t Jacob Schiff’s direct quote but that of Edward Griffin who actually said
“Today it is estimated by Jacob’s grandson, John Schiff, that the old man sank about $20-million for the final triumph of Bolshevism in Russia.”
I wonder if that might be the same Edward Griffin who said:
“There is much evidence indicating that the Capitalistic and Communist conspiracies BOTH are directed by a single master conspiracy which may have continuity with the Order of the Illuminati which was founded 200 years ago…” (The Capitalist Conspiracy, G. Edward Griffin).
Cheka Tricks, The Marcos Solution, etc. Please stick to your original name here – there is no need to bounce around from one name to another. I reiterate the generally accepted rule here that name changes are fine – people sometimes like to be known by a new name – but be open and clear about it. Thanks.
Fedup, your evasion and obfuscation is deliberate, and achieves nothing. I could easily have predicted that you would avoid the question, but in my optimism I seem regularly to think you can change!
Dreolin
I disagree with what Jonathan Cook is saying – the job of an interviewer/journalist is to challenge what is put in front of them – not just what those in power/authority are saying. What was Kirsty Wark meant to do – just agree with Glenn Greenwald and not challenge what he was saying. I’m afraid in a democracy all viewpoints are up for challenge.
Jon, what are you driving at?
If I recollect the last time you were asking me to write about myself!
Now you are stating your usual charge of evasion.
How’s about setting up a swearing in ceremony, and clarifying what kind of a uniform we are to wear?
What the fuck about obfuscation? You are the one paragraph wonder, who responds with absolutely no position stated. Would a signed confession be good enough for you, or do I have to have three witnesses to counter sign it too?
You are making it bit too obvious Jon, don’t you?
Phil,
I said I’d come back to the point about arming the Palestinians, and I’ll do so now. Buried in the usual mountain of text, Fedup/Passerby made a subtle reference to it last year I think, though I’ve no idea why people cannot come right out and say, “I support the arming of the Palestinian people”. The right wing presently are not at all shy about their support for arming the Syrian rebels, after all (though they are a great deal more reticent about their Islamist tendencies)!
In the general case of an oppressed people fighting against an imperial aggressor, I am not opposed to the arming of combatants. However, I think it should be looked at on a case-by-case basis. The left is rightly angry about the imperial West’s accidental creation of Al Qaeda, a direct result of the strategic provision of weapons that turned into blowback decades later (admittedly for geopolitical ends, rather than any humanitarian concern).
So, let’s consider arming the Palestinians. Well, the first question is who would do it? There is no question of the UK/USA doing it, even if someone reckons they should – they would be arming an opponent of Israel, who are in turn a strong ally. Yes, yes, I know that the left believe that Israel should be jettisoned as an ally (and I would support it), but we need to analyse the situation from the current starting point, not from where we believe it ought to be. That should be obvious.
Do we think Iran or Syria should do it? Well, they could, but to what degree? Anything that would turn the Palestinian fighters into a real force to be reckoned with would be foiled by US intelligence, or perhaps result in a retaliatory bombing campaign from Israel upon “a suspected nuclear production site” as has happened in the past. Thus, the mundane practicalities of arming the Palestinians is a difficult one.
I am also wary of who it is that we would be arming. It could be said of the Palestinian resistance that their sending makeshift rockets into civilian areas comes partly as a result of the cynical security wall that Israel is using to grab more land and apply collective punishment; now IDF targets are so hard to come by, any Israeli target is seen as fair game. I agree to a point that Israel holds some responsibility here, and certainly the wall is indeed is a despicable part of the injustice heaped on an already battered people. But, the blame is not exclusively to be placed at Israel’s door, since Israeli civilians were already a target before the wall was built*.
It would be my hope that, if Palestinian fighters must kill people (and I rather wish they did not) then they would only strike Israeli military targets. In the rules of war, the IDF are a legitimate target, but – I hope it goes without saying – civilians are not, under any circumstances. (As an interesting aside, if we get to a lasting peace settlement, an even-handed prosecution of war crimes on both sides is going to be extremely difficult, and I suspect they will both just have to settle for a truth and reconciliation commission. The reason for this in relation to prosecuting Palestinian fighters, relates to how international law works: they are a relatively disorganised bunch with limited central command, and so the killing of civilians may be difficult to prove as organised state policy, in the way that IDF crimes could be. But, I digress).
OK, so the process by which we are to get weapons to the Palestinians is fraught with problems, and may result in an increase in the deaths of Israeli civilians. We therefore have two objections already to this proposal. But it would not stop there. If it is successfully attacked, Israel (covertly or openly supported by the United States, and with no substantial British objection) would do Cast Lead again, killing another 1,500 civilians in Gaza. Or more, of course. If the proposal here is for so many Israelis to be killed by a fresh wave of Palestinian resistance that the effect is an American-style Shock And Awe, the Israelis will always retaliate. That is their “mad dog” policy, and whilst I find their foreign policy singularly dreadful, I imagine it has on occasion dissuaded some attacks on their borders, and thus in a narrow analysis of human behaviour (morality aside) it exhibits some rationality.
I am minded to think that, even if weapons were to help the situation rather than just create more carnage, to what purpose would they be put in decades to come? This is the law of unintended consequences writ large, even if the Left believed their original purpose to be a humanitarian one. It occurs to me that weapons these days can be programmed to stop working after a preset time, which perhaps could ameliorate the problem somewhat if such controls are indeed effective. But that is another technological and logistical problem that would probably be overlooked in practice from any government wishing to get involved.
So, in summary, arming the oppressed in this case is fraught with danger, and I am minded against it. That is not to say that I would not change my mind if the situation on the ground were to change. If I could be assured that the weapons would be used only for the narrow purpose of reclaiming Palestinian territory up to ’48 or ’67 lines, that the resistance would obey the accepted rules of war in relation to the protection of civilians, and that there would be no blowback against Palestinian civilians, then perhaps I would support it. But that’s not where we are, even if we do not like it.
Thus, I think that talking is the only solution. My understanding of the present position is that Palestine is willing to come to the table with no preconditions, but that Israel is not. I therefore regard the lack of progress as broadly Israel’s fault, and it is obviously made worse by the ongoing building of illegal settlements. Nevertheless, talking is the least worst option, and I think it should be pursued as vigorously as possible.
* I should state that the level of blame I assign to individual Palestinian fighters for the killing of civilians is complex, because the situation is complex. The death and loss and destruction seen disproportionately on the Palestinian side to my mind creates such a madness as could be legally argued as diminished responsibility in, say, any European court of law. However, as much as I am loathe to say it, I extend that judgement (perhaps to a lesser degree) to members of the IDF, who themselves are bathed in an atmosphere of propaganda, violence and racism. Who are we to say that, if borne an Israeli Jew and fervently believing in the patriotic nonsense pumped out by the neocon media, we would not support “the defence of the homeland”, however barbarous? I think this is explains why there is only a small socialist/peaceful Left in Israel – good people though they are – because most Israelis are influenced by the propaganda they are subject to, just as most people around the world are.
“What was Kirsty Wark meant to do – just agree with Glenn Greenwald and not challenge what he was saying.”
Without saying so in so many words, Kirsty Wark was accusing Greenwald of being irresponsible. She was mouthing the establishment line. The fact is that Kirsty Wark wouldn’t have 10% of the guts of Greenwald and she knows it.
If journalists are not going to hold the Government to account, who is? (Don’t tell me “the Opposition” because we all know that’s not how it works.)
“I’m afraid in a democracy all viewpoints are up for challenge.”
ESPECIALLY what the Government says about what it’s doing. And especially when it’s been shown to be lying on more than one occasion. And especially when it’s just been shown to be spying on all its citizens – via a reciprocal agreement with another, separate, State.
Who is Wark working for? The British people? And shouldn’t she be concerned about the British people being properly informed? She seemed to be more concerned with pandering to GCHQ and their pretend concerns about “terrorists”.
Her most stupid question to Greenwald was about whether his revelations would enable “terrorists” to alter or modify their methods of communication. When Greenwald replied that “terrorists” were already well aware that they were under surveillance and their electronic comms being monitored, what did she say? Nothing. Did she show any concern about comms of ordinary citizens being recorded and kept? No. Zip. Zero.
I should mention that I’m only here very rarely now, and I won’t be engaging in batting ping pong balls back and forth.
Recommended
Humanitarian Wars and Their NGO Foot-Soldiers
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article36429.htm
All very interesting, and academic, about what Schiff and his cohort did, said and gave.
More to the point, what would they have to say now about the plight of the Palestinians, 65 years on from Al Naqba? Any doubts or guilt?
Kirsty Wark
http://english.turkcebilgi.com/Kirsty+Wark
http://mrishmael.blogspot.de/2010/03/scotland-best-part-of-england-infamous_10.html