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758 thoughts on “Cui Bono?

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  • MJ

    Re Electric Universe theory: I didn’t know it was a grand theory and I’ve only encountered it on one occasion. As an amateur astronomer I often look at the moon. The crater Tycho is very interesting. Its distinctive rays, well-defined ribbons of uniform breadth, extend in all directions for up to 1000 km.

    Yhe orthodox view, that the rays were formed by the ejecta of a massive impact with an asteroid or some such, doesn’t seem plausible to me. The rays are too long and the lines are too clean. The best alternative explanation I’ve found comes from the thunderbolts site mentioned above. It contends that the crater and its rays are the result of a massive electrical discharge caused by the moon getting too close to another celestial body. It cites laboratory research that has replicated the scenario and which has produced results similar to those seen on the moon.

    The fact that gravitational forces cannot be reproduced in the laboratory is not a big issue here. There are plenty of craters on the moon that have almost certainly been created by impacts and we can look at those. In almost all instances their rays are much shorter and do not have the clean, uniform lines of Tycho’s. They get increasingly diffuse as they extend out, as you might expect.

    I wouldn’t care to comment on the wider implications of the electric universe theory but in some particular circumstances it might be onto something.

  • Ropeadope

    Ah, Resident Dissident is back, characteristically perseverating on minutia divorced from context while struggling against the gestalt (it’s principle, by the way.) Go back and reread the decision, you’ll eventually comprehend what I wrote – if you did your homework. I won’t rub your nose in the paragraph you’re ignoring so intently, that would be humiliating.

    Keep at it, to rise above your indoctrination will be a hard slog. In rigid hierarchical societies like britain, this is how the subaltern classes are trained, to view human rights not as a curb on overreaching states but as a weapon against their designated enemies. It helps perpetuate the castes, you see. So think as you please, it’s not as though your betters give a rat’s arse what you think! Downtrodden but defiant, that’s John Bull, except around authority. Then they bow and scrape – quite grotesquely, to foreign eyes.

  • A Node

    Peacewisher: “I think that was just a tease, Anode.”

    Well, you may be right, perhaps I’m reading to much into it, but it seemed to me that Snow was trying to undermine Galloway’s character – hint at some sinister motive. Having played back the news clip on the 4OD website, I think George agrees with me

    John Snow’s opening words: “George Galloway, one is bound to question whether your preference for the unelected dictators Assad and Saddam Hussein perhaps beats Tony Blair’s interest in invading Iraq.”

    George Galloway reply: “Well that’s an entirely false dichotomy and a diversion from what we’re hear to talk about which is the 7 years which TB as spent as Quartet Envoy.”

  • John Goss

    “Stop being smarmy and trying to cosy up to me, Mary, you know it won’t work.”

    I had to smile. 🙂 Sorry Mary.

    His previous comment on the genocide in Eastern Russia by Willy Wonka’s fascist conscripts though I treated by ignoring. It is almost as bad as his advocation of torture in Guantanamo. But these dissenters don’t mind what happens to people as long as the west reigns supreme. RD pretends to have sympathy for the Al Jazeera journalists but has defended that disgusting penal institution illegally constructed on Cuban soil, as well as solitary confinement in supermax prisons, which he does not consider to be torture. So, you can smile at the odd humorous comment, but despair at the majority. Shame.

  • Resident Dissident

    ” RD pretends to have sympathy for the Al Jazeera journalists but has defended that disgusting penal institution illegally constructed on Cuban soil,”

    Another post, even more lies from the old ****

    “Ah, Resident Dissident is back, characteristically perseverating on minutia divorced from context”

    Oh like your claims about the actual court case that were just made up.

    “Keep at it, to rise above your indoctrination will be a hard slog. In rigid hierarchical societies like britain, this is how the subaltern classes are trained, to view human rights not as a curb on overreaching states but as a weapon against their designated enemies. It helps perpetuate the castes, you see. So think as you please, it’s not as though your betters give a rat’s arse what you think! Downtrodden but defiant, that’s John Bull, except around authority. Then they bow and scrape – quite grotesquely, to foreign eyes.”

    And lets throw in a bit of racism and prejudice – because that is what it is pure and simple. Clearly you did not enjoy having your basic dishonesty exposed so you just resort to vitriol.

  • Tony M

    @ habbabduk

    Well if the UK authorities had made the least effort to identify those responsible, an apology might be forthcoming, instead of, as you read above, rounding up the ‘usual suspects’ throwing them down stairs. torturing them etcetera, and only years later admitting they’d framed totally innocent people. A proper investigation would obviously have found in many cases that those responsible were rather a bit too close to the British state itself. You obviously commend such behaviour as you spend every day on the internet defending the very same disgusting criminally insanve acts when perpetrated by Israel. It’s called synthetic terror, the British state effectively ran the IRA for decades and thus perpetrated many outrages against itself. The result of such UK state-sponsored terror was to rekindle waning sectarianism, anti-Catholic and anti-Irish division, stoked-up leading to discrimination, victimisation, violence and for many people, lives of family and friends taken. From which neither Ireland or Scotland have yet fully recovered, but will. Such unproductive discord is something you get wet over, you delight in and take perverse pleasure in, and applaud, here on this site and no doubt in other places too. You have been banned here for your offensiveness and your sick gloating twisted nature, and haven’t even got the good grace to depart, knowing you are not wanted, you wouldn’t be tolerated anywhere else either.

    You are without doubt the most sick and hypocritical person it has ever been my misfortune to encounter on the internet. You really are a case, and the biggest low-life by stirring up religious and sectarian hatred, here in the British Isles and in your unconditional support for the theocratic supremacist racist state – Israel – and its depraved political and terrorist philosophy Zionism, that has blighted Europe, the middle-east and entire world, since early in the 20th century. Hate is something you must know a great deal about, to hate is your sole reason for living, you define yourself by what you hate and what you hate is everything that is not you. Zionism belongs in the dustbin of history, it is a mental affliction, along with Nazism which it spawned, the two are incestuously and forever interlinked, synonymous for unmitigated evil. Your sort are Zio-Nazis, a term the controlled establishment Guardian propaganda organ banned some time ago when it became widely used in its comments section, a mirror held up to the ego-maniacal supremacist super-race, so acutely accurate, it resulted in panic-stricken heavy-handed blatant censorship.

    The rest of the world are not like you, they aren’t psychopaths, they try to get on with everybody they encounter in life, aren’t judgemental and don’t start from a position of hubristic superiority and contempt for others. Your way is the way of the past. Creatures out of step with evolution, some vile mutated pre-homosapien throwback.

    Time and tide are against you, Bye Bye Apartheid Israel, hello Pluralistic Palestine.

  • OldMark

    Dodgy refereeing in Brazil’s favour pt.94

    From tonight’s game- Fred’s blatantly offside goal, followed 5 mins later by a scything tackle from Fernadinho which inexplicably escaped a yellow card.

  • Resident Dissident

    TonyM

    I hope you feel better for that rant, though I doubt it did your blood pressure much good – and all because Habba doesn’t like blowing up people and has the ability to see more than one side to an argument.

  • A Node

    Peacewisher: “Well, if you think that’s bad, Anode, how about this interview with Anna Botting on Sky News:”

    Oh yes, there are many worse journalists than Jon Snow.
    In one programme, he ….

    makes prejudicial remarks to interviewees.
    makes theatrical protests about the imprisonment of Western media stooges but ignores the Israeli murder of journalists in Palestine.

    …. and yet he can still be considered one of Britain’s better journalists. Very depressing.

  • Tony M

    Habbabduk does like blowing people up. Palestinians, Ukranians, Russians, Iraqis, Syrians, Muslims etc. etc. ‘It’ glories in death, the evidence is all over almost every page on this website. And to suggest ‘it’ can see more than one side of argument is frankly ludicrous and untrue, you lie, constantly, you’re repeatedly, daily called out for it, you’ve zero credibility, just like ‘it’. Flogging a dead horse, both of you and your clones and socks.

  • Herbie

    A Node is right.

    It’s a tad naive at this stage of the game to be expecting salvation in a mainstream media voice.

    They’re employed to present a core narrative and if they’re not doing that then they’re banished to a cubby hole at the end of the corridor, or simply pushed out the door.

    Former Guardian journalist, Jonathan Cook, explains all:

    http://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/

    Or you could look at what former New York Times journalist, Chris Hedges has to say:

    http://www.truthdig.com/articles_by_author/chris_hedges/section/report

    Follow Medialens for an understanding of how it all works, and many current email to and fros with mainstream hacks:

    http://members5.boardhost.com/medialens/

    And of course there’s Orwell, for those who prefer the classical and distanced view, purified by time.

  • Ropeadope

    And to think we used to be such ardent Anglophiles. It’s tragic to see how English culture has degenerated. All the coherent commenters here are cosmopolites utterly at odds with the glittery-eyed aggression and the servile INGSOC and the sick Saville perversion of the place. Wait till the world clips your wings in the UNSC. You’ll end up like the Pitcairn Islands.

  • Sofia

    Tony M. 10 28pm

    What could anyone add to that wonderful, passionate outpouring?

    I think Dad’s true value is that every now and then he blows those fuses that usually keep people too polite to give him the treatment he deserves. Thanks.

    He always gets a bit agitated when he’s down to his last couple of crates of gin so remember, if you need a rest there’s always Habbbreak, open source at it’s best!

    IT REALLY WORKS!
    CLEANS BLOCKED DRAINS TOO!

    And leaves you with precious time for the treasures that so many other contributers drop into Craig’s blog.

    Here’s Willy Hague, showing the world the kind of company he keeps, but not convincing his followers. Poor wee mite!

    https://twitter.com/WilliamJHague/status/481013461015887872/photo/1

    It brought to mind a song my old uncle used to sing,

    One evening in October
    When I was about one-third sober
    And was taking home a load with manly pride
    When my feet began to stutter
    So I lay down in the gutter
    And a pig came up and lay down by my side

    Then we sang “It’s All Fair Weather”
    And “Good Fellows Get Together”
    Till a lady passing by was heard to say
    “You can tell a man who boozes
    By the company he chooses”
    And with that the pig got up and walked away

    Surely Ukrainian fascists will have the pig’s instinct with this creature.

    Ben, Ba’al, Brian, A Node, Jemand and MJ.

    Thanks for your continuing efforts to educate me. What a delicious mix of rationality, poetry, healthy scepticism, an interesting clip (once the music was muted) and knee-jerk denunciation. Just this once I’m not going to fire off with my opinions because I really haven’t got a clue, though my gut response is to root for the underdog-paradigm.

    My question, “Where does all the charge go?” sure put the cat among the pidgeons. I had no idea I was treading on the ground of cherished beliefs and, dare I say it, mandated narratives / taboo subjects.

    Now my appetite has been well and truly whetted. My starting point is a feeling that we’re missing stuff. I want to knowis this. Is that because it isn’t there or because it’s important for string-pullers (academic, corporate, political and/or religious) that stuff that’s there is missed.

    Of course the very idea that there may be string-pullers in the field of science and cosmology puts me well in the camp of the dreaded conspiracists, but I’m getting pretty immune now, ever since I was denounced as one for putting up a link to Nuland’s famous coup-plotting phonecall.

    So, I’m off to explore the cosmos and may be some time.

    Goodnight.

  • Peacewisher

    @Herbie: Yes, of course it would. However, the likes of George Galloway have clearly become accustomed to the narrative, and can use it to their advantage. In this case, Jon Snow actually managed to keep to the narrative and helped bring George Galloway’s opinions closer to the viewer.

    See him as a modern day Oskar Schindler. 🙂

  • Fedup

    A spokeswoman for Mr Blair said: ‘These are all people viscerally opposed to Tony Blair with absolutely no credibility in relation to him whatsoever.

    ‘Their attack is neither surprising nor newsworthy. They include the alliance of hard right and hard left views which he has fought against all his political life. Of course he completely disagrees with them over the Middle East. He believes passionately in the two State solution but also believes that can only be achieved by a negotiation with Israel.

    Clearly the spokesthing for the war criminal whom should be awaiting his trial in Hague in a just world is sucking up to the “Lobby” that none dare to mention, and reliant on the money conversion conduit; take huge chunks of taxation funds and divert morsels of it to be secreted by the relevant toadies in assets and secret bank accounts.

    Because umpteen ambassadors, peers and others have been signing letters to declare the war criminal as yet not committed to any trial, and subsequent investigations into his conduct in the build up and conduct of the Iraq war; unfit for office other than the prison librarian.

    Mr Miles said: ‘Tony Blair is the wrong man in the wrong job. The wrong man because he is identified with the war in Iraq; criticism has concentrated on his misreading of intelligence and his lies, but equally important was his failure to plan for the peace, with the result we see today. The wrong job because patching up the Palestine economy sounds good but avoids the real issue, the repression and misery of the occupation; that is what the quartet should tackle. Seven years on it’s time to blow the whistle.’
    ..
    The letter says: ‘We, like many, are appalled by Iraq’s descent into a sectarian conflict that threatens its very existence as a nation, as well as the security of its neighbours. We are also dismayed, however, at Tony Blair’s recent attempts to absolve himself of any responsibility for the current crisis by isolating it from the legacy of the Iraq war.’

    ….. Mr Blair ‘misled the British people’ by suggesting Saddam Hussein had links to al-Qaeda.

    Read all about it; Three former UK ambassadors to the Middle East will tomorrow join calls for Tony Blair to be removed from his role as Middle East peace envoy.

    Blair is facing calls to step down from his role as Middle East envoy after a scathing letter signed by former British ambassadors and politicians that accuses him of trying to “absolve himself” of responsibility for the crisis in Iraq.

  • Peacewisher

    Numbers do seem to be rising… now 5172. How many will be needed before he either (a) resigns (b) gets pushed?

  • Ben-LA PACQUTE LO ES TODO

    Sofia et al; There is much i would like to link that I’ve already discussed on Squonk, but for those hardy souls who just love to plumb the depths of theory…….

    http://wwwth.mpp.mpg.de/

  • Ben-LA PACQUTE LO ES TODO

    IMO, Quantum mechanics fails to address the issue of Dark Matter. String theory is exotic and EU is extremely exotic, but AE’s dream of a unified field theory escaped the outsized genius primarily because of his age and a lack of verifiable research to augment his out-of-the-box creativity. If there is one thing we know it is that light is both particle and wave. String theory rankles many because it seems deterministic and folks don’t like being told there may be some guidance that transcends personal free will. My feeling is that there is room for both free-will AND Determinism, if you are flexible enough to concede parallel universes and alternate realities.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unified_field_theory

  • Ben-LA PACQUTE LO ES TODO

    Sorry, the link @ 1:57 is broke-ass. Try this….

    “The incompatibility between local quantum field theory and general relativity is one of the main open problems in theoretical physics. String theory is an attempt at its resolution”

    http://www.aei.mpg.de/32695/String_Theory

  • BrianFujisan

    Peacewisher

    Going back to the Snow..or freeezin cold fkers debate

    this cannot be justified….Here AT 2 ;50 both the Question…and answer…Snow And Chomsky Are cnt’s

  • Peacewisher

    Well, Brian, you can again see it two ways. You can see it was Jon Snow being aggressive to a dear old man, or you can see it as Channel 4 News being brave enough to put a radical on mainstream prime time TV to present his views. One might think of the BBC putting on a neocon in similar circumstances. I get the impression that these two know each other and Snow is coming across as aggressive but Noam isn’t taking any offence at all. Again, could be a Schindler factor working here.

    Now 5407 signatures to SackBlair. Do you remember how the pop charts were manipulated back in 2007 to make sure this banned record didn’t have to be played as part of the BBC Radio 1’s top thirty:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydt0SL5rYow

    Blair was still PM at that time. Yet Channel 4 was still showing programmes such as this (sorry about the low volume level):

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydt0SL5rYow

  • Mary

    From a doctor friend in Gaza.

    Dear All Great Friends
    Dear All Brothers and sisters

    It is with deep sorrow, that I am informing you of the sudden deterioration and death of our beloved brother and friend Dr Mofeed El Mokhallalati who passed away this morning a few hours after undergoing a CABG Surgery to replace blocked coronary arteries.

    I am sure most of you knew him or at least met him. He was the founding dean of Faculty of Medicine- IUG and the former minister of health, He was an active, sincere, kind and humble man who sought welfare for his people and worked very hard to advance the medical education and health care system in Gaza strip.

    may Allah bless his soul, forgive his past sins and guarantee Paradise for him.

    Respectfully yours
    ……

    ~~~

    A response

    Thank you for telling …. and me of the passing of brother Mofeed. He was all those things that you say below. I met him several times and could feel his energy and see his commitment. I recall he came from Jaffa, having been displaced by the evil hordes. I could see he had to suppress those strong feelings about the robbery of your land. In that ‘containment’ there is likely disease. Since I first went to the remnants of Palestine I could see this concealed anger and thought cardiovascular disease was possibly triggered by it.

    Tell his family that we share their sorrow for the loss of a decent man who was a giant in his efforts for the medical school. Tell them also that …and I, and good friends think of our sisters and brothers in Palestine. We do our best to help bring attention to the inhuman actions of the occupiers – now especially.

    …..

  • Mary

    Zionism in practice – Israel’s Daily Toll on Palestinian Life, Limb, Liberty and Property
    24 hours to 8am 21 June 2014

    1 attack – 49 raids including home invasions – 3 beaten – 1 dead – 8 injured – Economic sabotage – 40 taken prisoner – 10 detained – 117 restrictions of movement

    Israeli Army opens fire on people near Bab al-Zawiya
    Israeli Army home invasions death – obstruction of medical aid – assaults and injuries
    Israeli Army violates orphanage in night raid
    Israeli helicopter-borne troops occupy home as sniper post
    Israeli Army raid – news media intimidation
    Israeli soldiers abduct three 15-year-old boys
    Night peace disruption and/or home invasions in 3 refugee camps and 34 towns and villages

    AND THE PREVIOUS DAY

    24 hours to 8am 20 June 2014

    4 air strikes – 3 attacks – 55 raids including home invasions – 1 dead – 4 beaten – 25 injured – 2 acts of agricultural/economic sabotage – 50 taken prisoner – 13 detained – 136 restrictions of movement

    14-year-old boy killed in Israeli Army night home invasion
    Israeli air strikes injure children and woman – damage homes
    Israeli air strikes cause injury in East Gaza
    Hijacking: Israeli Navy opens fire on fishing boats – crew taken captive
    Israeli tanks shell Beit Hanun farms
    More Israeli Army violence including beatings – 3 youngsters aged 14 to 16 among the injured
    Settler fanatics beat up and hospitalise West Bank villager
    Night peace disruption and/or home invasions in 3 refugee camps and 30 towns and villages

    Those are the headlines. The detailed narrative is even more shocking.
    http://www.sapienspromise.org/modules/news/
    (click on Read more)

  • Jay

    Mary

    The non Jews of Palestine would have it in their best interest to leave the land and find another land to settle and flourish. The amount of good will among non Jewish people like yourselves could help them find a homeland and help them settle and flourish.
    It would need to be a fertile land and similar to Palestine in nature.
    Maybe Turkey. This then would free up Israel for Jews to settle and then Jews and non Jews could help the Palistinians.
    I am hoping that Israel will lead the world and distinguish itself in other ways satisfactory for all.
    With the Palestinians moved and aided all should be well and doing this could focus many people and resources and will nurture good will.

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