For anybody who doubts the reactionary single voice the UK media has become, it should be obvious from what you see on the surface, eg the unanimity of attack on Corbyn, the SNP or Assange. But if that doesn’t help, look below the surface.
Ex-Hedge Fund manager, now Murdoch leader writer Oliver Kamm published a disgusting and blatant lie and smear about me. Very quickly, Nick Cohen, Hadley Freeman and Marina Hyde of the Guardian and Stephen Daisley of ITV were popping up sending him personal tweets to congratulate him on it.
Usually it is best to ignore the lies of far right Murdoch employee Oliver Kamm, but there is one lie about me which he has been spreading so assiduously I feel I have to counter it. In Prospect Magazine Kamm states that:
“Craig Murray, a former diplomat who’s imaginatively reinvented himself as a “human rights campaigner,” claims that the charges against Assange are founded on political correctness.”
This is absolutely untrue. I have said no such thing. What I actually said in an interview with Kamm was “Due to a mistaken kind of political correctness the British media refuses to publish all the details of the case.” You can hear it here.
There is a massive difference between saying that the media refuses to publish the facts due to political correctness, and saying that rape itself is a matter of political correctness. I abhor the latter view. As Nadira has asked me to remind you, my partner is herself a rape victim.
In this interview with LBC Oliver Kamm went on to insult and lambast me and say that I claimed that the rape charges were founded on political correctness. I tried to point out that I said no such thing, but LBC had cut me off. LBC later put up the version you hear on that link in which Kamm’s remarks are given in full and my own are edited. But it is very plain indeed that I did not say what Kamm goes on to accuse me of saying.
Kamm then tweeted that I had stated that rape is political correctness. Though this was plainly untrue to anybody who listened to the LBC link which he attached, he started to receive congratulatory messages from his friends on twitter. To anybody who has yet to catch on that the mainstream media functions in collusion, it should come as no surprise to learn that this Murdoch employee received personal tweets attacking me from Nick Cohen, Hadley Freeman and Marina Hyde, all of the Guardian, and from Stephen Daisley of STV.
Rape is an appalling crime. Any sex without consent constitutes rape.
But I do not hold that the truth or falsity of an allegation of rape may not be subject to scrutiny. Anybody who does hold that is handing unchecked power to the state to eliminate opponents. I do think it is deplorable that the British media has not published the detail of the case. Then people could learn this.
Kamm’s reactionary friends can congratulate him all they like. What he is doing is spreading a deliberate lie about me. But it may just lead to a few more people researching what is really happening in the Assange case, and that would be karma.
UPDATE
I contacted Prospect magazine and they have now changed the Kamm article to state what I actually said. It is still of course surrounded by Kamm’s ultra right wing mendacious interpretations, but at least it no longer says that I said something which I did not say. For the rest, Mr Kamm is entitled to spew the vile nonsense he is so well paid for by Murdoch, and his mates at the Guardian love him for.
Medialens has an extremely pertinent Alert today:
http://www.medialens.org/index.php/alerts/alert-archive/2016/812-rebranding-the-conquistadors-as-social-justice-warriors-the-guardian-corporate-sponsorship-and-branded-content.html
“That of course should read ‘Zionist Cabal.’ -Chris Rogers
And I thought that your typo should have read “Zionist Canaille”
@Bevin,
I have already had the pleasure of reading the MediaLens opinion as for ‘Zionist Canaille’, well that’s a good find and thanks for pointing it out to me, particularly given the fact that in the early years of the UK administration of Palestein the Zionists were want to call the Jeweish Labour Movement all sorts of unsavoury things, among them ‘canaille’ – which just goes to show even more than 80 years after the fact that Zionism was a proto-neoconservativism, well according to some historical studies.
Chris Rogers
Thank you for providing that link (‘Physicians for Social Responsibility’: http://www.psr.org/assets/pdfs/body-count.pdf). I hope you’ll forgive me if I hold off from (possibly)commenting until I’ve had the time to read it carefully.
For now, all I can do is to deplore the rather uncouth and hostile tone of the rest of your post – and to correct a couple of errors which were no doubt inadvertent.
You say:
“your risible contention that figures quoted for deaths attributed to US Imperialism in the Middle East by numerous posters on this Blog are bogus”
If you look at my first post you will see I was responding to the 4.000.000 figure advanced by one poster (not “numerous posters”) and did not claim it was bogus; I asked him if he could give a breakdown of that figure and indicate sources.
So you have mis-represented me twice in your very first sentence. Did you say you were a “trained historian”?
But, having read your post, perhaps I should have been bolder and claimed that Bert’s 4.000.000 figure WAS bogus. Why so? Because I notice the following in your post, no doubt based on the link you offered:
“.. in a short timeline its estimated up to 2 million have lost their lives.”
Since your figure is a mere 50% of Bert’s figure – representing a mere two million fewer people – I’d be interested to hear the adjective you would apply to Bert’s figure.
When I read your link I shall of course be paying particular attention to what the authors have to say about how the claimed 2.000.00 deaths came about – for example, are they the numbers killed by Western military intervention or do they include what you might call “Arab on Arab killings”.
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If “Bert” is still reading this thread, I cordially re-invite him to back up his 4.000.000 deaths figure (indicating his sources. I mean, he wouldn’t just have plucked that figure out of his head, surely?
Chris Rogers
Oh dear,I should have guessed.
I’ve long noticed that anti-West and anti-US diatribes on here by one or the other poster tend to be followed in fairly short order by posts from the same one or other poster going on about….. Zionism.
Having just read your effort at 15h53 I note that you’re no exception to that general rule.
Good of you to let me see the pus coming out of that anti-Israel pimple of yours! 🙂
Bevin – I see the good old lefty New Statesman is taking the corporate shilling too. It has partnered with the government of UK-approved tax haven, Gibraltar:
http://www.newstatesman.com/gibraltar
At one point it also splashed its association with Phillips on its webpage. The splash has gone, but the advertorials boosting NHS privatisation remain:
http://www.newstatesman.com/2016/01/new-role-industry-new-future-nhs
“In association with Phillips”….”for example, Phillips”…
I think we can say that real journalism is dead.
Except on the Internet, at least up to now (although the trolls would dearly like to kill it here too).
The London Review of Books still publishes things like Seymour Hersh’s pieces dissenting from the official U.S. line.
Habbakuk,
Unlike Mary I have far thicker skin, I also post under my real name and have no issues with proclaiming myself an anti-Zionist, which as both you and I are fully aware makes me neither a ‘new anti-semite’ or anti-Israel. As with many others, you spread bullshite, whilst I had the temerity to qualify what i stated, namely that deaths attributed to US interference in the Middle East since the end of WWII would probably exceed 4,000,000, with 50% of that figure being killed since 1990, as the report I linked demonstrates, and note it only covered from the First Gild War.
Again, you keep denying the reality and espousing crud on these boards, boards i’ve read for about 12 months. Now, given I’m unable and unwilling anymore to try and bring some sanity to The Guardian’s boards, I find myself here and hope to contribute to some of the dialogue, I will also point out that my main study areas are modern European History and not the Middle East, hence the rise of fascism and NAZISM has been a focal point of ones studies over the years, that and issues of finance, which I’m not trained in, but well versed in the heterodox school. Oh, and Noam Chomsky is one of many I correspond with, whom to me at least is a shining example to us all, well apart from Zionists that is.
Why are the British press so abjectly in the thrall of the reigning system? It’s because of the extent to which what’s left of British power and wealth depends on Britain’s relationship with the U.S., with the most important parts of that being GCHQ’s involvement in the Anglosphere’s signals intelligence program and financial shenanigans as practiced in the City.
I’ve mentioned that I’m currently reading Ambassador Maisky’s wartime diaries. In his entry for June 17, 1940, he quotes Randolph Churchill as telling him the following:
“Even if the worst comes to the worst, France can survive without its Empie. . . . England’s position is different: if we lose our Empire, we shall become not a second-rank, but a tenth-rank power. We have nothing. We will all die of hunger. So, there is nothing for it but to fight to the end.”
Well, Britain/England did lose its empire, and his prediction has not yet come true, but only because of the special relationship with the U.S.
“..if we lose our Empire, we shall become not a second-rank, but a tenth-rank power.
Well, Britain/England did lose its empire, and his prediction has not yet come true, but only because of the special relationship with the U.S.”
_________________________
Written with all the relish only a certain type of Irish-American can come up with?
Chris Rogers
I think The Guardian’s gain is going to be this blog’s loss but welcome anyway. I suspect you’ll feel very much at home on here if you carry on in the same vein.
Anyway: I shan’t waste time picking up on every little bit of nonsense in your diatribe – I’m confident you’ll offer me ample opportunity to do so in the future by way of your future posts.
Just one thing, though.
You say (somewhat inelegantly):
“As with many others, you spread bullshite, whilst I had the temerity to qualify what i stated, namely that deaths attributed to US interference in the Middle East since the end of WWII would probably exceed 4,000,000, with 50% of that figure being killed since 1990, as the report I linked demonstrates, and note it only covered from the First Gild War.”
This is what you actually said yesterday:
“Please note that the paper only deals with attributable casualties after the US War on Terror was formalised and not prior, however, I’m confident you are no doubt aware that the USA has been meddling in ME affairs since the early 1950’s, instigating a coup in Iraq in the early 50’s, not withstanding all the shit undertaken in Iran.
No doubt you’ll dispute said figures provided, but in a short timeline its estimated up to 2 million have lost their lives.”
Where are the 4.000.000 in your post of yesterday?
Some “trained historian”.
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PS – very impressed that you “correspond” with Chomsky.
Well lets see how long it will take other countries to stop the carnage. Colonial Canada has stopped all bombing in Syria.
Weird that the majority of bombers are also TTIP supporters.
Habbabkuk,
if you were acquainted with the British Foreign Secretary in the years after WWII, one Ernest Bevin you’d be aware he was opposed to the UK being a US poodle, to the extent, and despite massive austerity, our nation under a Labour Government embarked on an ambitious atomic programme and renewal of its conventional military capabilities. Indeed, it was the US that contributed greatly to the demise of the Empire in the post war years – just look at its economic policy in the Far East vis a vis the Dollar Zone and Sterling Zone. Now, please do us a favour, i’m a proud Welshman who despises US imperialism as much as British Imperialism, and I say this as someone who’s not so distant relatives fought in the South African campaigns of the late nineteenth century, Rorkes Drift no less.
One could go on about US machinations against the British Empire and despise all those of approve of the UK’s status as a US arsewipe, which I find rather unsavoury, as does Craig Murray I trust. Hence, lets have you issue some facts for a change, rather than demand them from other posters as you ‘bait and switch’. Your pedantism is most annoying to put it bluntly.
I should have also made a mention of Keynes, he too was not to well disposed to the Yanks and was also treated badly by the US in negotiations he undertook with them when serving Attlee.
Chris Rogers
I forgot to ask: does your obvious interest in Israel and Zionism arise out of your special studies of fascism and Nazism?
I shan’t waste time picking up on every little bit of nonsense in your diatribe – I’m confident you’ll offer me ample opportunity to do so in the future by way of your future posts.
Well nobody will scream for you when you go, why don’t you frequent your newly discovered lawyers blog, rather than abuse newly joined posters here, you are nothing but an incorrigible old sod, a nitpicking cyber terrorist.
Nevermind
“Well lets see how long it will take other countries to stop the carnage. Colonial Canada has stopped all bombing in Syria.
Weird that the majority of bombers are also TTIP supporters.”
____________________
Do you include Russia in that hope?
Habbabkuk,
I owe you an apology, had not realised you were responding to Lysias, as such, most of my comment stands with the caveat that of course the Tories feared losing the Empire and its loss impacted the UK’s working-class greatly, however out of its ashes came the Commonwealth, which despite its historical beginning may have been a force for good and counterweight to US hegemony – at the end of the day i’m a pluralist as far as IR goes, hence i believe a multipolar world is safer than a single superpower, or bipolar World, and the UK was quite good at maintaining the balance of power in Europe after the Sever Years War, just a shame we don’t stand up for our national interests anymore, hence my disdain for print post 9/11 US foreign policy that has been a disaster.
And should you have an interest and open mind, a good website dealing with geopolitics is this: http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/
Nevermind
“Well nobody will scream for you when you go, why don’t you frequent your newly discovered lawyers blog, rather than abuse newly joined posters here,”
_______________________
I think you’ll find that the newly-joined poster is no slouch when it come to insults (and insinuations).
I’m beginning to get an idea of why he’s been excluded from the The Guardian’s blog; he seems like one of those blokes who pester their local MP with tales pof persecution all the time.
My point in citing Randolph Churchill as quoted by Maisky was to try to explain the abject servility of the current British media.
Chris Rogers (17h38)
It’s OK, no apology necessary!
We shall get on just fine if we keep it polite, open-minded and most important of all, honest.
If that was the point then I must say it’s a pretty feeble one.
I believe Macky provided this link:
http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2010/hp220110.html
This caught my eye:
Kamm contends that the March 2003 U.S.-U.K. aggression against Iraq “was the most far-sighted and noble act of British foreign policy since the founding of Nato,” that “President Bush is a man the Left can and ought to work with,” and that the “[Left’s] finest ideals are now enshrined in US policy.”
Let’s sit back and absorb that comment: “the most far-sighted and noble act…..”
Do I laugh or cry?
Lysias,
Its fair to say that the Churchill clan were rabid imperialists, although I don’t think for a second Winston Churchill would be pleased that the UK is a US arsewipe, I think he would have been highly upset, as for his son, well that’s a different story.
Anyhow, we digress, the fact remains that media coverage against JA has been appalling, and that the likes of the “zionist cabal’ bring UK journalism into disrepute. Its about time these hacks did their job instead of being whores, which is what they are and even that’s an insult to prostitutes the world over.
‘I should have also made a mention of Keynes, he too was not to well disposed to the Yanks and was also treated badly by the US in negotiations he undertook with them when serving Attlee.’
Chris R- Keynes expected too much of the septics in late 1945 when the loan negotiations were in full swing- he was the first of many ‘special relationship’ believers to get a reality check when attempting to defend UK interests in the post war period- the US knows full well how weak Britain’s position is, and exploits this fact.
Initially Keynes sought to elicit sympathy from the US by alluding to the high level of British war casualities compared to American casualities (none of the latter were, of course, civilian), and he began the negotiations thinking he could get grant-in-aid, or an interest free loan.He was soon told to get lost by the septics, whose stance actually hardened as autumn 1945 wore on; Keynes played such a bad hand (because he over estimated US goodwill) that an initial loan offer of $5billion repayable over 50 years at 1% was rejected, and we ended up getting instead $3.75 billion at 2% interest. Sterling also had to be ‘fully convertible’- a condition which precipitated several ‘sterling crises’ in the Bretton Woods era.
“..if we lose our Empire, we shall become not a second-rank, but a tenth-rank power.
Well, Britain/England did lose its empire, and his prediction has not yet come true, but only because of the special relationship with the U.S.”
_________________________
Written with all the relish only a certain type of Irish-American can come up with?
Habba- Randolph Churchill’s fears, as reported in the Maisky diaries, were widely held by the British elite during the middle third of the last century, and Lysias is pefrectly entitled to draw attention to them. Hence the FCO believing for 70 odd years and as an article of faith, that instead of Scandinavian insignificance, a place in the second division, in return for a strongly pro US foreign policy, is somehow a ‘good deal’ for the UK.
Arguably, Randolph Churchill’s fears of British post imperial insignificance colour the debate on the retention of the ‘British nuclear deterrent’ to this day- by any rational measure Trident is neither independent, nor ‘British’ and only a very marginal ‘deterrent’.
Habbankuk,
In response to your enquiry, my interest in modern Israel stem from my studies of the Holocaust whilst at University in the late 80’s, essentially how a modern post-enlightenment European nation can implode and turn to barbarism on a massive scale, which is a worth academic study if we look at modern Israel’s relationship with Palestine – it also worth noting that there is not much between rabid Zionism and Nazism, both of which I’m opposed to.
Far from being anti-Israel, I, like many others recognise Israel exists, that it has a right to exist, that it has a right to defend itself and that peace based on its 1967 borders is achievable. Indeed, not only am I indebted to many of the Jewish faith for my socialism, but I think the UK can learn much from Israel on defence issues, although killing innocents is not one of them.
I’m pleased to inform you that i have Jewish working class friends, somewhat older than me, who fought in the 1973 Israel-Arab conflict and had the greatest pleasure of studying with an actual Holocaust survivor whilst at University in the UK, which really did bring some meaning to our studies.
At the end of the day I wish for peace and mutual understanding in the Middle East, or at least between Israel and Palestine, which would be a fine start, however, I’m opposed to Israeli apologists, i’m British and their is much my nation has done and does that i’m appalled with and am critical of it, it does not make me anti-British, it does make me politically aware, hence another reason to park my arse here given i’m unwelcome on The Guardian for my leftwing/libertarian views.
Kamm contends that the March 2003 U.S.-U.K. aggression against Iraq “was the most far-sighted and noble act of British foreign policy since the founding of Nato,” that “President Bush is a man the Left can and ought to work with,” and that the “[Left’s] finest ideals are now enshrined in US policy.”
That’s integral to his role as a supporter simultaneously of New Labour (ie Blair and its clones) and of neoconservatism. In other words, he’s a Trojan horse for the likes of Kristol, Gaffney, Abrams etc. See this for details om where he’s coming from. As previously mentioned, he’s a patron of the Henry Jackson Society.
The HJS is a registered charity.
http://www.spinwatch.org/index.php/issues/politics/item/5627-charity-commission-article
No problem about its wholly apolitical goals*, then.
*please do not spray your coffee on the screen
http://www.spinwatch.org/images/Reports/HJS_spinwatch%20report_web_2015.pdf
Chris Rogers – a welcome and well-informed addition to any debate. However, as you may have noticed, no question is ever answered to Habb’s satisfaction, he exists solely to bait and provoke, he declines to substantiate his own assertions, and frankly he’d lower the tone even of the Guardian comments. There is no need to take him too seriously. Simply enjoy the furious bombast and chuckle, perhaps, at the sad and friendless life he must lead.
@Ba’al Zevul,
Many thanks for the welcome and I have indeed noted that Habbankuk is a bit of a handful shall we say – however, I’m opposed to censorship or closing down of dialogue, which is why I’m miffed at The Guardian as it declines in its moral value and vicious turn to the right of the political spectrum, which is a loss to many old Guardian readers I assure you.
@Old Mark,
You are indeed correct about how badly the USA treated Keynes, indeed those terse negotiations contributed to his death. Further, and given the Uk was instrumental in the development of the US atomic bomb, it goes without saying that the Yank’s treated us badly in relation to that matter of fact. I’m always impressed when I read about Ernest Bevin’s time at the FCO and realise he was no angel, but he was loyal to the working class and in my book that’s what makes him a political giant – as for the supposed ‘special relationship’, well its a one-way street and our elite, as per usual, flatter and delude themselves.
@Nevermind,
Suffice to say Habbankuk did get one thing right about me, namely I actually did threaten to knock the block of my Labour MP for abstaining on the Tories Social Welfare Act in July last year – I did this on Facebook, Twitter and his own website, I did not hide, I did not cower and had I got my hands on the bugger he’d have had a black eye, a black eye i’d be happy to serve time for I can assure you.
I can also assure readers that politics in South Wales, particularly Labour Party politics certainly ain’t nice or for the fainthearted, further as a result of my verbal attack on our MP I was barred from voting for Corbyn, i.e., i was one of the ‘banned’ for not being a socialist allegedly!!!