I leave Edinburgh this afternoon for London, to stand trial at the High Court for libel. To answer a question frequently asked, the reason I have accepted English jurisdiction is that the event was a Sky News broadcast, an English broadcaster. If it had been over my blog I would not have accepted jurisdiction as I do not accept the English claim to universal jurisdiction over internet content.
I do hope that this trial will help bring into further disrepute the immoral and draconian English libel laws. If I lose, the total costs and damages I would have to pay will potentially amount to some £350,000 – a ridiculously disproportionate result for the alleged civil offence. It would ruin me and blight the lives of my young family. Whether this can possibly be an appropriate reaction to something I said in response in a live debate, you might judge for yourselves by reading the court documents .
Thanks to the astonishing generosity of the readers of this blog, at least I am in a position to defend myself robustly. Over 5,000 readers of this blog have, with incredible generosity, contributed a total of £100,323 towards my defence to date. The libel laws are so oppressive because the sums of money involved are so astonishing. The entire massive English libel industry – courts, judges, barristers, solicitors – is taken together a major financial interest in itself, well represented in parliament. It is in all their collective financial interest that this system of oppression rolls on, which of course requires a good chance of people being found guilty to encourage more plaintiffs into the industry. I often feel this analysis from unconscious institutional self-interest is often neglected in favour of the equally valid and important argument that the libel laws are an essential tool of the wealthy and powerful to discourage free speech by the poor. Robert Maxwell, Alisher Usmanov and Jimmy Savile are three examples of people who kept their true nature hidden by constantly and aggressively threatening people with the disastrous consequences of an English libel suit.
Finally the trial starts on Tuesday 7 November at the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand, High Court Queen’s Bench. It will last probably two and up to three days. It is open to the public. I would very much welcome anyone with the capacity to report any of what happens on social media. I am not aware of any restrictions on this, but will try to publish them here if I learn of any.
This is probably my last blogpost until after the trial, as I must concentrate now. By the time I come back online the Tories will have appointed their next Disgraced Former Defence Secretary in Waiting.
So a Spanish judge has issued a European Arrest Warrant for the Catalan PM.
He says he ‘won’t be going back’.
Oh yes he will! The Belgian court has no power to stop it.
Not only is the Catalan ex-government a laughing stock but by associating with them the SNP are making Scotland a laughing stock.
http://plus.lesoir.be/122276/article/2017-11-02/le-kroll-du-jour-puigdemont-fait-trembler-la-majorite-federale
Yes, I agree and it all reflects very badly on Scotland and makes this country look an international joke by reflection. I suspect that few people will want to wave esteladas in Edinburgh from now on. Here’s my take:
http://www.kenbell.info/2017/11/the-catalan-crisis-has-become-catalan.html
You denigrate, belittle and sneer at Catalan nationalists throughout your piece and say nothing derogatory about the fascist Spanish nationalists.
I’m proud Scotland has been noticed as a source of support for Catalans. If some people abroad want to laugh at Scotland then they’re not the kind of people whose good opinion is worth having.
It is all slipping away.
Scotland is going to remain part of the United Kingdom
As Craig has pointed out, a recent opinion poll showed that (excluding don’t knows) 53% of Catalans supported independence and 47% opposed it. Rajoy’s thuggish behaviour will push more Catalans into the independence camp.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2017/10/intellectual-dishonesty-guardian/
You two should go to Brussels and make a civil unrest then, nothing to stop you now that the EAW has been issued by some fascist judge, purporting to be doing this for Spain.
Unaccountable oiks who have nothing at all to say about the rights they sought to obey when they spoke their oath.
What would you say if the democratically minded voters of the EU line you up with the ‘unaccountable’ and the elected Rajoy to be water cannoned against a strong wall?. Will you make sure to wear your jackboots?
The right to self determination, just cogens, has been agreed by the west and the east, it is globally accepted and should not be derailed by unaccountable placemen of the establishment/vested interests in the EU commission, it is a universally agreed principle and right for the 370 plus million people living in the EU.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination
Have you read the article you posted a link to? Third paragraph down.
The principle does not state how the decision is to be made, nor what the outcome should be, whether it be independence, federation, protection, some form of autonomy or full assimilation.[
Catalonia is already an autonomous region. One of the possible outcomes of achieving self determination.
What makes you think you have the right to re-define the meaning of “self determination” to mean what you want it to mean?
It’s not quite that clear, but the Belgian authorities are certainly in a difficult position. He chose his country to flee to well!
According to the media the Belgian authorities have sixty days to act upon an arrrest warrant.
Also country can reject an EU arrest warrant if it fears that extradition would violate the suspect’s human rights. Looking at Spain’s violent handling of the Oct 1st vote one could easily agree that Puigdemont’s wellbeing could be at risk if returned to Spain.
Well, there’s probably an Ecuadorean embassy in Brussels.
“Oh yes he will! The Belgian court has no power to stop it.”
The Belgian courts can decide whether or not to enforce the warrant.
Spain is going to CRUSH Puigdemont
“The Belgian courts can decide whether or not to enforce the warrant.”
We were always told in the case of Assange that Britain had no choice but to execute the warrant. So there’s more room for manoeuvre than we were told?
Yes they can, but depending on what happens in the Belgian courts either Puigdemont or the Spanish government could, if the Belgian courts decide against them, have a good go at getting the Belgian government involved, and the ECJ involved too.
Puigdemont is playing well, not just because of this but because propaganda-wise such a course of events would get emphasised because Brussels is the central city of the EU and in many minds is especially associated with that union. (It’s also the central city of NATO, but far fewer media consumers outside of Belgium know that.) The Catalan entity has not successfully had any ambassadors accredited anywhere yet, as far as I know, and they are playing very well with the hand they’ve got.
Anybody who thinks they aren’t getting help from abroad is living in cloud cuckoo land.
Remember the “history” between the Spanish Netherlands (which included most of what is now Belgium) and Spain.
Cf. how the issue of Turkish entry into the EU is viewed in Austria.
“Someone” is having a field day. I wish more people understood psychological warfare. I’d recommend Paul Linebarger’s book as somewhere to start.
The Spanish Netherlands were a very long time ago. I never heard of any ongoing “special relationship”.
Puigdemont doing well? You must be having me on. He’s running desperately from one crisis to the next.
Puigdemont doing well? You must be having me on. He’s running desperately from one crisis to the next.
It all depends now on the disposition of the Belgian judges chosen to adjudicate on the EAW
The Spanish Netherlands were a very long time ago
Indeed- but most towns of any size in Flanders seem to have a ‘Spaniaard Straat’ close to their historic centre
Donated. Good luck.
Good luck, Craig – you’ll be fine
Only discovered your blog this year, but am now a regular reader. Disgusted by the thought of you being put through the mill and possibly silenced by ill-intentioned rogues. Very happily donated to the cause .. but please god sanity prevails in this farce of a trial.
The non-disclosure agreement imposed by Boris Johnson on Danielle Fleet wasn’t simply about their “affair”. It was about an unplanned pregnancy, some acts of violence, and a pregnancy termination.
The unplanned extramarital pregnancy by Boris is number FOUR that we know about: he had two with Petronella Wyatt and one with Helen Macintyre – he often refuses protection.
Word is that May will retire on health grounds and then Davis will appoint Rees-Mogg to replace Johnson.
We need to keep up the pressure for a general election ASAP. The Tories are on the run, and they will do their utmost using their media to portray reality otherwise.
That’s the plan. Tory government falls, general election, Corbyn gets in with a minority government, Brexit cancelled. In short order. Many Tories and probably the PM herself actually want this.
I think the original plan was to involve Blairites and then stop Brexit and let them take the fallout. But It finally dawned on Chukka Can’t that he was being played – Corbyn put his foot down that no labour mp would be involved with the Tory Brexit. So with that avenue gone, what’s left but to through an election and throw the election. I wouldn’t count on Labour stopping it though, but they will negotiate a more reasonable deal.
In the meantime Hunt is being sued for not following due process – he has essentially been acting unlawfully and illegally in some places privatising the NHS, the news papers haven’t bothered to hold him to account so he’s been getting away with it.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/jeremy-hunt-health-department-nhs-legal-action-americanise-privatisation-customers-id-pay-a8033986.html
Plan? Since when has this rotten system ever had more that a blue kite? facetious wishful thinking, get ready for more uncertainty and mudslinging, fake news and a rising inflation, our normalcy for some time to come.
Those who refuse to educate their children to the system they are being subjected to, are criminals with intent!
But they don’t want a Labour landslide, and they will need means to ensure things don’t swing in that direction.
What the Tories need to do is convince a proportion of people who would otherwise vote Labour to vote for some other party or to abstain.
They stupidly thought the UKIP vote, most of which had come from Labour, would go back to the Tories, and the LibDems are now out of the game because after decades of saying how different they were they snuggled up to the Tories as soon as they got the chance, surprising nobody on the left.
The Tories won’t achieve their aim by going on about the IRA. They were stupid to focus on that, but they are not so stupid as not to learn their lesson.
What the 52% vote for Brexit was really about was xenophobia, from people who’d been denied any other “reasonable” avenue for their (often very justified) concerns about immigration and in the knowledge that white working class people are viewed by the middle classes (even the lower middle class) and politicians as little better than lumps of barbarian dogshit (as are non-white working class people, but they are not who I’m talking about).
Put all this together, and d’y’know what? I think the Tories are going to play the race card, that’s what. It is very interesting that photos of posters saying “IT’S OK TO BE WHITE” are getting splashed in the media.
Whether the aim in electoral terms will be to get the target market to vote Tory, to abstain, to vote for an existing far-right party (unlikely), or vote for some kind of “new” movement which is enough to hold a few seats for the Tories, is unclear.
I think you may well be right, N.
Though I think it may be just a little subtler than you suggest. And I’d still give evens on a comprehensive clusterfuck, with no evidence of any politician’s having thought beyond the end of his own nose.
The Brexit vote was a great opportunity to reimagine our economic base, and end an unhealthily dependent relationship with a mix of unsuccessful states and our major industrial competitors. It would have necessitated diminishing the influence of a parasitic service economy on the public at large, building productive capacity and adequate infrastructure, and ensuring that training of the resident population was good enough to prevent further strain on our resources due to mass immigration.
It didn’t, though. As we should have expected from a legislature largely awarded arts degrees at Oxford, and legally trained, we’re bogged down in endless debates, muddled thinking and self-interest. Pish on the lot of them.
Tory Toffs – what a total waste of time and space.
I despise them too. But don’t underestimate the force behind Rees-Mogg. Few have ever campaigned so openly for the chairmanship of the Treasury Select Committee. His persona has been well-managed and sells him as unpoliticianlike.
Mogg’s dad was editor of the Times, and he should not be underestimated.
The top three contenders for the Tory leadership at the moment are Johnson, Davis, and Mogg. Johnson shows the effects of enormous cocaine consumption in practically every interview or committee appearance he does. The man must hardly have a septum left. He also boasts that he hasn’t had masturbated for two decades because he can always find a woman, often a young one. He has got women pregnant at least FOUR times (Petronella twice) extramaritally, and one has to wonder whether it is really the case that so many women open their legs for him voluntarily without bothering about contraception. So many people hate Johnson’s guts, many in the upper echelon of MI6 think he’s working for the Russians, and the stupid cokehead bastard may befriend whatever oligarchs are laundering their billions in London at any given time but he isn’t ever going to be prime minister.
When he crashes, that will leave the elderly David Davis, who may not have been named in the Dirty Dossier but who has still been called a sexist annoyance towards women, and…Jacob Rees-Mogg.
Jacob is a catholic, I do not think we could have a catholic prime minister in the United Kingdom.
@freddy
“Jacob is a catholic, I do not think we could have a catholic prime minister in the United Kingdom.”
That is certainly an important factor when we consider his chances. And he’s not just Catholic but a fan of the Tridentine mass. But the Tories have had a Catholic leader before – Ian Duncan-Smith – and the country has also had a Catholic prime minister in the person of Tony Blair. Blair had been a Catholic for a long time (seen attending Westminster Cathedral and so on) without acknowledging it, and he officially converted to Rome a day before he left office – an act which was surely intended to establish a precedent. Whichever way you look at it, it was meant to send a message, because otherwise the ritual could have waited a few days.
Prejudice in the Tory party against Catholics wasn’t strong enough to stop Duncan-Smith become leader when they were in opposition. Where do you think the anti-Catholic opposition will come from that could stop Mogg taking over as Tory leader and PM? From within the Tory party or the civil service or where?
George, I quite like Mogg, he is amusing, unlike Sturgeon, who is unamusing in the extreme, dull, in fact.
Tony Blair is a liar, he took us to war on a huge untruth, he wouldn’t know how to tell the truth.
He was a person not to be trusted.
I have the sense, that Jacob can be trusted.
“I quite like Mogg, he is amusing…
I have the sense, that Jacob can be trusted”
Sadly, this is not untypical of what passes for political thought these days.
Gawd help us.
The Weather Forecasters with their Supercomputers – which I paid for with my Taxes – have got it wrong again.
No rain was forecast and its pissing down.
How are we going to start our bonfire?
Useless people who can’t forecast anything in even 3 hours in the future.
These propaganda idiots are also brainwashing you about Climate Change.
Don’t trust them – they are even more useless than the politicians.
Tony
I shit you not – I have not heard a single firework so far this ‘season’.
I blame Brexit. And Tory austerity. Oh and Trump.
You’ve been brainwashed about climate change if you don’t believe it is the biggest problem facing us. The trillion dollars Trump wants to spend on useless nuclear weapons could be a lifesaver if it could help avert the worst that is to come. Serious scientists, not weather forecasters, are very alarmed at the latest data. With good reason.
Climate Scientologists are not serious scientists . The climate changes. It has always changed, it will always change. There is nothing that can be done about it except to tax it.
@Anony “Anon7
“The climate changes. It has always changed, it will always change.”
You are absolutely right.
“There is nothing that can be done about it except to tax it.”
And use it as an excuse to mobilise the population into utter subservience around the insane and anti-nature goal of stopping the climate from changing.
When a person goes into Sainsbury’s, a supermarket store in which huge amounts of resources have been spent on packaging that has been designed and used solely for reasons of profit, including on the psychological influence that is part and parcel of marketing, on bright lighting to make defrosted vegetables seem fresh, on heating tall spaces to induce a feeling of freedom, etc. etc. etc. – and other wasteful things that rarely get talked about – and then they see on the wall a boast by the rich scum who make profit from the company, speaking in the name of this weird and abstract thing called the “company” itself, asserting that it has “saved” enough energy to power a small town in the third world (yeah but it’s gone on fucking profits, hasn’t it?), and they don’t feel angry, or like vomiting, or both, frankly that person can shove whatever submissive “thoughts” they believe they have about “climate change” right up their arse.
Let me summarise: anybody who believes climate change is principally caused by human actions is a fucking moron.
A compelling argument, made me reassess the mountain of documented scientific evidence on man-made climate change.
Fossil fuels are good for potency, it keeps you pecker up, the last gasp assurances of an industry in decline.
In three years time China will run rings around those who think they can rule the world with war. It will show us a thing or two about sustainable living, organic agriculture, alternative energy generation in the community and more.
And all we could possible think of is war and more oil to keep Anon7’s pecker up.
What twaddle Nevermind, it is plain for a blind man to see, that Global warming is a bollox to tear money from the ordinary persons to give to the rich
Anonymous crewman on the Titanic:
“Nothing to worry about. Ships list. They have always listed, and they will always list.”
“You’ve been brainwashed about climate change if you don’t believe it is the biggest problem facing us.”
How do you know you haven’t? Let’s start with the fact that there’s massive wall-to-wall propaganda promoting the view that you hold. Do you accept that?
Oops – that could be misinterpreted. I mean to ask Ian how he knows that he and his fellow accepters of the official position on human-caused climate change, are not the ones who have been brainwashed.
Five minutes of clear thought is all it takes to realise that as Anon7 rightly says, the climate has always changed and it always will.
It has never changed at the same rate as it is changing now or anything like. Natural changes occur over millennia not decades. When we came out of the last ice age temperatures rose 4 degrees but it took 10,000 years, the temperature has risen by 1 degree in the last century..
Freddy it won’t be as cut and dried as you and others think.
If the Belgian courts decides Puigdemont has a case to answer, his lawyer has said the whole affair could take two months to reach a conclusion. Puigdemont can appeal to three different levels of court in Belgium, a little success could pave the way to bigger things.
However if Puigdemont decides at a later date, (say a month or so) to seek political asylum in Belgium, then you cannot be extradited from the territory whilst the asylum process is ongoing.
So is he then going to have a government in exile in Belgium? The whole thing is becoming irrelevant.
Better then to rot for thirty years on antiquated charges (sedition, rebellion) that a EAW doesn’t recognise, on it 32 EAW list, in a Spanish prison with no outside voice.
No in my opinion Puigdemont is doing the right thing by involving Brussels whether they like it or not.
Disgusted of England
SNP minister Mark McDonald quits over ‘previous actions’
BBC
Yes Freddy I agree inappropriate behaviour cannot be tolerated, no matter the political party.
Sturgeon has tweeted ‘Disappointed to lose @markmcdsnp from ScotGov but we can’t accept this sort of pervy behaviour. He is fine to continue as an MSP.’
Can someone explain why ‘pervy’ behaviour is acceptable for a member of the Scottish Parliament. Surely she should be suggesting he resign his seat?
Bob.
Could you provide a link, thank you.
I don’t see anything on the feed below
https://mobile.twitter.com/NicolaSturgeon?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
My bad. It was a fake twitter account. I would delete if I could and will be more careful next time.
Bob.
I’m pretty sure that Michael Fallon only resigned his cabinet post and not his constituency seat.
Does that me his constituents are less worthy?
Think that might be a fake twitter account. I don’t think Sturgeon would tweet the word ‘pervy’.
Strange, SNP politicians don’t normally resign over a bit of sleaze.
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/sleaze-mp-my-shame-at-3-in-bed-teen-950312
2012 that’s going back a bit, surely there must be more recent SNP sleaze?
However Labour are the masters of sleaze, and then some.
https://labour25.com
The Liberals are the kings of Sleaze
A Reading councillor who had to resign after a racism row has avoided jail after police found indecent images of children and bestiality on computers at his home.
Warren Swaine was found to have pictures of girls as young as 13 and 14 years being abused by men, when officers searched the computers.
Swaine was previously a councillor with Reading Borough Council but was forced to resign after controversial remarks about Labour MP Chukka Umuna .
“I am waiting for the Labour guy to claim, ‘is it because I is black’ as a defence for being a muppet,” the former Liberal Democrat councillor said in an online tweet.
Cllr Swaine began to find things out.
He began to find out about some of the corrupt behaviour of the central core of the Reading Labour Group.
http://jane-griffiths-my-book.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/strange-history-of-warren-swaine.html
One fateful night our hero, aghast at the lamentable performance of south London Labour MP Chuka Umunna on a BBC game show for the masses called I think Question Time, tweets words to the effect that Umunna is a politically inadequate muppet (he is, gorgeous isn’t everything, Chuka) and imagines the response of Streatham’s finest as “Is it because I is black?” Reading Labour do not do Twitter, they have barely entered the 1990s when it comes to “new media”, so when these words were gently brought to their attention by a kindly nurse they decided that Something Must Be Done. Racist, they said. Will Not Do. That Man’s Head Must Roll. Besides, he’s been finding out about All That Stuff that led to Resignations and Police Involvement
Fred, I understand that there was no shagging involved in the link you provided, nor any petting, heavy or otherwise. However, if it gives you pleasure trawling over such non- stories, go on yersel! ?
A Tory Minister just resigned because he put his hand on someone’s knee.
But as far as the Nats are concerned SNP MPs can do no wrong.
Well, Fred, the owner of that knee doesn’t believe that was the reason of his resignation, so I’m going along with her thoughts. You can continue on your research of tittle tattle, if it gives you pleasure.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_McDonald_(politician)
bit slow on the uptake tonight Wiki
Oh Fred, you see life’s affairs with such binary clarity.
Remember, remember, the patsy of November!
As we prepare to enter the week in which Craig must go to court to defend himself it is worth remembering another great man falsely accused, namely the noble Guido Fawkes. A man who spends each November 5th in Heaven drinking at the Patsy Club with Lee Harvey Oswald and Marinus van der Lubbe.
It’s interesting to see how an establishment-friendly official narrative has become the orthodoxy because it seems that at the time of the Gunpowder Plot it was widely assumed that the King and his minister Lord Cecil had set Fawkes and Co. up. It being their usual practice.
A contemporary writer:
‘Those that have practical experience of the way in which things are done, hold it as certain that there has been foul play, and that some of the Council secretly spun the web to entangle these poor gentlemen.’
Another:
A French writer has observed that the plots undertaken under Elizabeth and James I. have this feature in common, that they proved, one and all, extremely opportune for those against whom they were directed.
But this version has entirely disappeared from history, being replaced by one which paints the King and his minister in far nobler light while making the plotters out to be monsters.
In truth, it appears that whatever their original plan they must have been pretty noble fellows because despite horrific torture for weeks in the Tower – during which it seems that one of their number died on the rack – they all refused to implicate the Roman Catholic priests, which was the whole point of the affair cooked up by King James. And thus at great cost to themselves the plotters helped avoid terrible anti-Catholic reprisals.
It’s interesting that historians have adopted uncritically the official narrative because it makes no sense and whatever the plotters were about they can’t possibly have seriously been bent for months upon the enterprise of tunnelling under the House of Lords, or possessed the intention of then digging out a cellar big enough to accommodate 20 or 30 barrels of gunpowder; or of intending to somehow smuggle those barrels into the House of Lords.
One historian who does take a contrary view to the orthodox view was a certain J. Gerard who wrote the book in 1897 -What was the Gunpowder Plot? from which this information is taken. About the plot he said,
‘when we examine into the details supplied to us as to the progress of the affair, we find that much of what the conspirators are said to have done is well-nigh incredible, while it is utterly impossible that if they really acted in the manner described, the public authorities should not have had full knowledge of their proceedings.’
He points out too, that once the affair had been ‘discovered’ the barrels of gunpowder – as vast as the supply of Dover Castle, completely disappear from the record – no mention is made of them and no questions are asked as to where the powder came from. The implication being it either didn’t exist, or the barrels were filled with sand provided by one of the King’s stooges.
And we teach our children to burn the poor bloke! It is the effigy of King James we should be burning.
Good luck on Tuesday, Craig!
Sorry to be a bit dim, but I’m not clear if this for a real, or if it’s a clever satire on the 9/11 ‘truther’ nonsense.
It’s not satire, it’s an account drawn from the book What was the Gunpowder Plot by J. Gerard, London 1897. There are indeed similarities with 9/11, particularly the implausibility of the official narrative and the fact that anyone who points this out is automatically accused of talking nonsense.
Although, admittedly, the populace was far less gullible in 1605 and the official narrative was widely mocked. It took quite a few generations of burning effigies of the Pope on November 5th before the masses dutifully fell into lock-step with the Government’s account. This naive trust for the scoundrels who comprise our political leaders continues today as it appears in 2001 an effigy of Osama bin Laden was burned at the Lewes bonfire night celebrations. That noise you heard was Guido Fawkes turning in his grave.
I always wondered why there has never been a ban on fireworks in this country! I think you have revealed that reason. I wonder when they are going to release the redacted documents on that one!
Quneitra, SANA – The Syrian Arab Army thwarted on Saturday a fierce attack by Jabhat al-Nusra terrorists on Hadar town in the northern countryside of Quneitra province.
A field commander told SANA’s reporter that Jabhat al-Nusra terrorists attacked Hadar town from all directions as it is besieged by al-Nusra groups that are associated with the Israeli enemy which provided them with various kinds of support.
The support provided by Israeli enemy was by opening paths to transfer the terrorists in the town’s surroundings which extend on a very long front , as well as providing them with weapons, ammo, logistic coverage, supplying, and rushing the wounded to Israeli hospitals in the occupied territories, the commander said.
The army units, backed by the supporting forces, managed to retake all the positions which the terrorists had attacked and completely foil the attack and which attempted to establish a “buffer zone” serving the Israeli enemy.
http://sana.sy/en/?p=117237
Now, unless the United Nations in the guise of UNDOF, can confirm these reports
https://undof.unmissions.org/
we will not know, if this is just Syrian Government nonsense.
Can we hear from UNDOF?
I suggest all regular readers of this blog who intend turning up to the trial should wear some distinguishing item of clothing by which we might recognise each other. Such as, say, a black eye patch.
A pictorial snapshot of Spain’s political (fascist) DNA.
https://mobile.twitter.com/AleixVegreen/status/926902627543191552/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwingsoverscotland.com%2Fel-bombero%2Fcomment-page-1%2F%23comments
Hi Craig
If results go against you and you need further finacial help, please let us know. I am sure that we will dig into our pockets.
Good luck with your battle with the crazy English libel system.
Mark McDonald : S.N.P. minister stands down over
“inappropriate behaviour”
SCOTTISH childcare minister Mark McDonald has resigned over allegations about inappropriate behaviour as the sexual harassment scandal continues to rock British politics.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/875554/Mark-McDonald-reigns-SNP-inappropriate-behaviour-MP-list
The resignation comes after S.N.P. leader Nicola Sturgeon called for any victims of sexual harassment in Holyrood to come forward.
Quite right too, Nicola.
The scum should be got rid of, soon.
So the ultimate Named Person, the man who said the Scottish Government is better placed to look after our children’s interests, the man who thinks parents can’t be trusted with their own children has resigned due to his inappropriate behaviour has he?
Meanwhile, friends, here’s a news item: multi-billionaire Al-Waleed bin Talal has today been arrested in Saudi Arabia. He is the largest shareholder in Citigroup, one of the largest banks in the US. (For comparison, its assets are valued at twice those of Goldman Sachs, and it’s bigger than Barclays, Lloyds, and RBS.)
The Lehmans-times-10 (could be times 100 – who knows?) event that is clearly coming may arrive very soon.
And that event will mate with Brexit for sure.
“Dopey Prince @Alwaleed_Talal wants to control our U.S. politicians with daddy’s money. Can’t do it when I get elected. #Trump2016”
12 Dec 15
Mwahahahaha
What I’d like to know is whether Andrea Leadsom batted her eyelids when she told Michael Fallon she had “cold hands”.
Laughing in the Palestinians’ faces cont’d.
Netanyahu is on Marr at the moment, tanned, groomed and confident. He disputes anything Marr is attempting to say about the Israeli treatment of the Palestinians. All lies,
Freedom of Speech in Britain? An obscene joke!
Saudi Arabia arrests princes, former ministers in ‘anti-corruption’ sweep
http://www.france24.com/en/20171105-saudi-arabia-king-salman-arrests-princes-ministers-anti-corruption-sweep
Saudi Arabia has arrested dozens of senior figures including princes, ministers and a top business tycoon, in what authorities hailed Sunday as a “decisive” anti-corruption sweep as the kingdom’s crown prince consolidates power.
Prominent billionaire Al-Waleed bin Talal was among the 11 princes arrested late Saturday, reports said, immediately after a new anti-corruption commission headed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was established by royal decree.
Separately, the head of the Saudi National Guard, once a leading contender to the throne, as well as the navy chief and the economy minister were replaced in a series of high-profile sackings that sent shock waves through the kingdom.
It seems that things are hotting up between Iran and Saudi
Lebanon Prime minister resigns but in Saudiland?
Saudi Arabia intercepts missile from Yemen targeting main airport
http://www.france24.com/en/20171104-saudi-arabia-destroys-missile-targeting-main-airport-riyadh-yemen-houthi-rebels
The missile was fired from across Saudi Arabia’s southern border by Yemen’s Houthi rebels, who are at war with the kingdom. Several Houthi-owned media outlets, including Al-Masira and SABA, reported the rebels had launched the missile.
The missile was shot down by Saudi air defense forces, with fragments of the missile landing in an uninhabited area north of the capital. Saudi Arabia’s Civil Aviation Authority said the missile did not cause any damage to the King Khalid International Airport and that flights were not disrupted.
It is “suspected” that this would be an Iranian missile
The never directly elected Tory MSP, Murdo Fraser, is in hot water with football fans after attempting to decry their minutes silence in respect for those who fell during British wars.
Fraser tweeted that fans of a certain football club made noises throughout the minute. However when challenged Fraser could neither prove it, nor would he apologise, a typical Tory me thinks.
https://www.lastditchtackle.com/blog/2017/11/5/tory-msp-caught-lying-on-twitter-over-celtic-fans-minutes-silence-slur
Swastika’s popping up all over Catalonia now, no need to guess who’s doing it.
https://mobile.twitter.com/CataloniaHelp2/status/927106876306808832/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwingsoverscotland.com%2Fel-bombero%2Fcomment-page-1%2F%23comments
https://mobile.twitter.com/josepcosta/status/927068464900173825
It’s not that long ago that vile graffiti like this was a precurser to pogroms in Europe.
Wiki have now updated his profile, they probably did not do straight away as he is hardly of world importance.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_McDonald_(politician)
In the 2016 Scottish Parliament election, McDonald contested the seat and was successfully re-elected winning 56% of the vote and increasing the S.N.P. majority to 11,630 – the largest majority in the whole of Scotland.
Mark McDonald, the Scottish National Party MSP for Aberdeen Donside,
resigned as Minister for Childcare and Early Years in the Scottish Parliament, after “inappropriate” sexual behaviour
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Westminster_sexual_scandals
Must be a little embarrassing for Nicola Sturgeon,
what with Mark having the largest majority in the whole of Scotland?
As I’ve already said Freddy I agree there’s no place for any kind of inappropriate behaviour in government or political parties for that matter.
I’m sure you’ll agree?
https://skwawkbox.org/2017/11/04/deputy-pm-accused-of-extreme-pornography-screws-up-denial/
Oh dear Freddy, the British government just can’t seem to steer away from controversy.
https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/political-parties/conservative-party/news/90363/brexit-minister-steve-baker-reported-‘taking
RoS
The deputy Prime Minister claims he never did have porn on his computer,
when he was raided by the pigs, in his office in the Palace of Westminster.
It is one of those pigs who is now making this claim.
Damian Green says computer porn allegations are ‘political smears’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41874026
Theresa May’s most senior minister has denied a claim that police found pornography on his computer during a raid on his Westminster office in 2008.
First Secretary of State Damian Green said ex-police chief Bob Quick’s claims in the Sunday Times were “completely untrue” and “political smears”.
“when he was raided by the pigs, in his office in the Palace of Westminster.
It is one of those pigs who is now making this claim.”
Freddy.
Wait, what! One of those “pigs” you mean a police officer. You know the person you’d be screaming for, if you were assaulted say on the street.
Of course it will be a bit more difficult to find one, since the British government slashed their numbers in England.
Meanwhile Freddy, I’m sure you’ll be pleased to know that Belgium is in no rush to extradite Puigdemont.
http://www.euronews.com/2017/11/04/belgium-rules-out-puigdemont-extradition-to-spain
It is beginning to look like some notable European are not pleased with the EU’s stance on Catalonia.
“A hundred politicians, intellectuals and MEPs have signed an open letter to Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission, and Donald Tusk, President of the European Council, in which they criticize the EU’s silence regarding the crisis in Catalonia.”
https://www.ara.cat/en/intellectuals-slamming-EU-inaction-Catalonia_0_1899410126.html
How long can the EU remain silent, without incurring irreparable damage to it credibility?
“The signatories —which include personalities such as Professor Judith Butler of the University of California, Berkeley, the writer and MEP Barbara Spinelli, the former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, the Italian philosopher Antonio Negri, the Austrian writer Robert Menasse and the French sociologist Eric Fassin—…”
_____________________
With the possible exception of Varoufakis, hardly household names, are they. I bet that even the people who comment on here have not heard of any of them.
You still think as if the EU is an empire while it is just a confederation of small states when it comes to the imperial problems of its larger members.It is trying to let Spain know of its complaints regarding Catalonia as best it can through action and inaction.
Habbabkuk
Judith Butler and Antonio Negri are quite famous philosophers.
“It is beginning to look like some notable European are not pleased with the EU’s stance on Catalonia.”
The first person on the list is an American, Judith Butler.
Not that I care one way or another about Catalonia, only that its independence advances the cause of the Brexiters, in their hope of destroying the EU.
Habbabkuk-
In addition to Varoufakis I spotted Craig Calhoun, recently the Director of the LSE. Apart from those two ,I’d bet that a fair number of the signatories are beneficiaries of EU largesse, via the Erasmus programme and others, and are thus protective of what they think of as the ‘good name’ of the European Union.
Ros
He claims on his twitter that he can mute cybernats. He hears Celtic fans making noise when they’re silent.
I think Murdo lives in a fantasy world where he sees and hears what he wants to see and hear.
He probably thinks he’s popular with voters too, such is his propensity for self-delusion.
“Israel’s decision to deny an Amnesty International USA staff member entry to the occupied West Bank, apparently as retaliation against the organization’s human rights work, is a dangerous indication of the Israeli authorities’ growing intolerance of critical voices, the organization said today.”
https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/israel-denies-entry-to-amnesty-international-usa-staff-member/
Imagine it was Syria or Iraq, or any other nation considered to be a an oppressive apartheid country. The world’s media along with the UN, EU and Nato, would openly condeming there inhumanity. But no Israel, it gets a special pass, a feed hand, and has done so for decades.
Puigdemont and his colleagues in Belgium have surrendered to the police.
The BBC web site describes them in a heading as “Catalan ex-officials”.
They’re not ex-officials. They remain the democratically elected government of Catalonia. Only they’re not being allowed govern because of the actions of Francoist politicians and jurists. It’s easy to see where BBC sympathies lie.
I wonder why Mr Puigdemont and a few of his supporters fled the country for Belgium, so leaving others behind to face the music.
Belgium and Spain have long had the closest of political relations and I very much doubt that a EAW would not be honored.
Mr Puigdemont would probably do best to go to a non-European country. Perhaps he should consider Venezuela.
Surely it’s clear the Catalan ministers went to Brussels to speak with the EU. And Puigdemont hasn’t run away. He’s doing his best for Catalonia and democrats in Europe should declare support for the real rule of law in Catalonia. Not the Francoist fake rule of law.
Conveniently “speaking with the EU” at the very moment those he abandoned were facing the judge in Spain.
There are frequent daily flights between Brussels and Madrid/Barcelona.
If less recent nations of the world had their constitutional stances reinforced, by the outside world (Spain’s position for example) then national borders would’ve been immutable a long time ago. Leaving billions of people trapped inside nations with a government they did not recognise.
Thankfully that hasn’t been the case, in most instances.
The demotion of international law and its de facto subordination to the Spanish constitution is vital to the EU’s stance on Catalonia, for it supports the cornerstone of the EU’s policy on Catalonia: denying Catalonia’s right to national self-determination.
In the real world, such a fundamental right cannot be spirited away with the aid of a Brussels-endorsed magic wand.
Article 1.2 of the UN charter recognises the principle of self-determination – making this a right which transcends any state’s domestic laws. A fundamental principle of international law is that the provisions of a state’s constitution cannot be deemed inherently legal – they must equate with international law. For example, a constitution may sanction racial discrimination or genocide, but this is superseded by the international laws which prohibit both. To claim that a state’s constitution is the sole determinant on the legality of action taken within that state is to essentially reject the very idea of international law.
He did a runner
to Belgium
Stephen Fry revisited !
Carles and four others have handed themselves over.
Separatists in Catalan 0. Fascists in Madrid 1
The fascists should have been ruled offside but Douglas Ross was probably running the line.
Not that clear, as the judge might not send them back, allowing them 60 days to do their campaigning which looks like it will fail, and they will be sent afterwards to Madrid.
Their turning themselves in looks like they aren’t very astute,
Fleeing to Brussels wasn’t very astute either. The EU wasn’t going to save them, after the Scottish experience in Brussels. They should have died in the Barcelona bunker, or at least allowed themselves to be made martyrs at a show-trial.
On the contrary, by going to Brussels Puigdemont has opened up his position to a wider EU audience, and got them thinking. However if he remained in Catalonia, he would have most certainly been arrested and held in a Spanish prison, without a voice to the outside world.
Keep in mind that of the 32 offences on the EU arrest warrant, sedition and rebellion, do not feature, two of the main charges aimed at Puigdemont by Madrid.
As for bunkers, the most famous must surely be associated with Nazism, their salute the Seig Heil, is today used in Spain, not Catalonia.
Sometimes measures can be too deadly for the patient. Remember when the professor in colloid chemistry class talked about a colleague thinking he had found a cure for cancer, It turned out to be a lead colloid.
Barcelona bunker sound similar, but predictable coming from you.
“Sometimes measures can be too deadly for the patient. ” Puigdemont is not the patient. The patient is Catalonia. He should be ready to sacrifice himself for his country, if necessary, should he not, if he believes in his cause. But I don’t think he is. That’s why he fled.
I very much agree with Laguerre for once. As I have already said, Venezuela would have been a better bet. Or he could do a Snowden and flee to Moscow.
Corbyn to stand by promoted MP reprimanded for sexual harrassment allegations.
What message does that send out?
I’m sure Freddy wil be outraged by this decision.
Jeez oh, Westminster really is a den of iniquity.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4844447/male-labour-mp-sexual-assault-tory-mp-spike-drink/
Ros, the question is what precisely had Corbyn been told about allegations against Hopkins by the Labour whips at the time of Hopkins’ promotion to the Shadow Cabinet? If the allegations now don’t differ markedly from what Corbyn was previously told by the Labour Chief Whip then it really brings Corbyn’s attitudes into question. Corbyn is being very vague about what he was told earlier about the allegations.
According to this reel guid there had been prior murmurings on the matter.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/4838827/jeremy-corbyn-labour-mp-kelvin-hopkins-suspended-sexual-harassment-latest-news/
Ros.
And why did Corbyn sack Rosie Winterton as Chief Whip a year ago? According to reports at the time, he tried to sack her over the phone. She had done the job for 6 years.
Yes reel guid, the rabbit hole goes much deeper.
“First it was ‘anti-Semitism’ now the Labour Right (& the BBC’s Tory Kuenssberg) are weaponising Sexual Harassment”
http://azvsas.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/the-framing-of-kelvin-hopkins-mp-lies.html
Why not find an issue that can bring the left and right wings of the Labour Party together in a spirit of harmony?
Most Labour people, left and right, seem very comfortable with the suppression of democratic rights in Catalonia. You could all use that.
The two of you would rather see a perpetual conservative government in Westminster by the sound of you anti-Corbyn stance.
I’d much rather see left governments in independent Scotland, independent Wales and independent England. Corbyn isn’t interested in that and shafts Scotland every chance he gets. Why should we pussyfoot around him?
Apparently there’s a Tory MP, as yet unnamed, who is known around Westminster as ‘the lift lunger’.
Far from elevating is it?
Yes reel guid, shocking, Mary Whitehouse will be birling in her grave
Meanwhile Freddy.
You posted.
First Secretary of State Damian Green said ex-police chief Bob Quick’s claims in the Sunday Times were “completely untrue” and “political smears”.
Bob Quick stands by his claim and will give “evidence” to a Whitehall Inquiry tomorrow.
Looks like Damian Green is in a bit of Quicksand.
Ah I see what you did there, nice one.
Meanwhile more Labour sleaze, will it ever end?
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/scottish-news/1798038/labour-probe-as-msp-monica-lennon-claims-sexually-assaulted-senior-party-colleague/
‘the lift lunger‘ – going down? ?
Disgrace Brothers.
More European dignitaries are beginning to speak out with regards to Catalonia.
Former president of Finland, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize and international peace mediator, Martti Ahtisaari spoke in the Nordic Council.
“Spain should permit Catalonia’s former political leaders to return freely home and participate in the upcoming elections, due on 21 December, former president of Finland, international peace mediator and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize Martti Ahtisaari has advised.”
https://euobserver.com/news/139736
Pressure appears to be mounting towards the EU over Catalonia and its exiled minister’s.
This looks like fun:
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/05/what-are-the-paradise-papers-and-what-do-they-tell-us
Including a little more evidence that Russian Big Money behaves in exactly the same way as our own decadent capitalist globalists…
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/05/russia-funded-facebook-twitter-investments-kushner-associate
Could be some fireworks there.
One for Craig when he comes back.
The Offshore Secrets of the Rich Exposed
Featuring
Lord Ashcroft
Wilbur Ross (he was involved in Brandon’s acquisition of Northern Rock)
Alisher Usmanov
Farhad Moshiri
Etc
Paradise Papers: Tax haven secrets of ultra-rich exposed – BBC News
Huge new leak of financial documents has revealed how the powerful and ultra- wealthy, including the Queen’s private estate, secretly invest vast amounts of cash in offshore tax havens.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41876942
On the iPlayer
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b09fgcz3/panorama-offshore-secrets-of-the-rich-exposed
Plus tomorrow on BBC1 9pm-10pm
Britain’s Offshore Secrets Exposed
Panorama
Current affairs programme featuring interviews and investigative reports.
Release date: 6 November 2017
1 hour
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09fgcvh
That s/be Branson not Brandon!
I omitted HM Queen Elizabeth II from the list of those using offshore facilities.
‘All perfectly legimate’ according to a spokesperson. Of course.
Ehm is not the Crown Head of State of Bermuda. If you can’t invest in one of your own territories without criticism where can you invest?
Secondly Duchy of Lancaster does NOT have to pay tax so the inference of tax avoidance is a complete red herring.
Worth remembering that although you may personally be whiter than the driven snow, your bank, your insurance provider, your pension fund and indeed your government almost certainly benefit indirectly from income from offshore funds. The structure is not easily separable into white house and shitehouse – it’s tangled, interconnected and opaque. Neither the Duchy of Lancaster nor the punter with an RBS* savings account (receiving much less interest than RBS does from the same money) knows who’s holding the cash balance at any one time.
*for instance
Wow, has her spokesperson said it’s “legitimate”? Sounds like they are on their back foot. They don’t say “lawful” or “legal” because they know that would be awful PR (“One didn’t break one’s law, you know!), but to say it’s “legitimate” isn’t much better because at least a proportion of people will realise it’s not for someone who has just had a small amount of what they’re doing exposed to say whether it’s “legitimate” (i.e. clean) or not…
… not unless they get it all out into the open.
Wink!
So far, one has been referred to the pigs, only one?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41877151
A growing number of MPs are being investigated over allegations about their past conduct towards women.
Ex-ministers Daniel Poulter and Stephen Crabb are the latest Tory MPs to be referred to internal party inquiries.
One cabinet minister, Sir Michael Fallon, has already resigned while others have denied claims against them and remain in office.
Labour has suspended two MPs and is separately investigating an ex-official’s allegation of rape.
The parties have begun a series of investigations under newly constituted procedures into alleged inappropriate behaviour in response to a series of press reports in the last week.
Other cases have been referred to the Cabinet Office and, in one case so far, to the police.
So which M.P. has been referred to the pigs?
“So which M.P. has been referred to the pigs?”
Charles Elphicke.
Elphicke lives in London, with his wife Natalie, two children and Star, the 2012 Westminster Dog of the Year
In November 2017, Elphicke was suspended from the Conservative Party after “serious allegations” made against him were referred to the police. Elphicke stated: “I am not aware of what the alleged claims are and deny any wrongdoing.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Elphicke#Family
I have never heard of him.
It would seem, he is no longer a member of the Conservative Party.
But still an M.P.
So how many M.P.’s have recently been ditched by their parties.
I detest that Phillip Hammond,
I hope they get the dirt out about him soon.
Then we can have a new Chancellor who is all for BREXIT
Phillip Hammond seems like the type of guy who has sex with the lights off and his socks on. I wouldn’t hold my breath for a scandal involving the Chancellor.
On the other hand we all recall that John Major and Edwina Currie were getting down to business in Number 10 so anything is possible!
Why is no one suing for breach of confidence?
What is it suddenly apparently ok to abandon all and any due process and have trial by media?
Even the Tory party appear to embrace this in the case of Charlie Elphicke.
What is going on? Are we being acclimatised to summary justice by appearance? If so then why?
Anna Soubry agrees with you –
http://www.itv.com/news/2017-11-05/trial-by-newspaper-taking-place-over-westminster-harassment-claims-tory-mp-anna-soubry-says/
(and all media, everywhere)
However, she wasn’t in such a rush to allow Damien Green a fair hearing…
…Kate Maltby, who is three decades younger than Mr Green, told the Times he “fleetingly” touched her knee during a meeting in a pub in 2015 and a year later sent her a “suggestive” text message after she was pictured wearing a corset in the newspaper.
Mr Green said any allegation that he made sexual advances to Ms Maltby was “untrue (and) deeply hurtful”.
Two Tory MPs, Anna Soubry and Heidi Allen, have urged Mr Green to step aside pending the outcome of the investigation but Home Secretary Amber Rudd said her cabinet colleague had the right to defend himself.
“I do think that we shouldn’t rush to allege anything until that inquiry has taken place,” she told Andrew Marr.
http://www.ezspk.co.uk/2017/11/05/damian-green-says-computer-porn-allegations-are-political-smears-6/
( few other outlets have highlighted this)
I’m no fan of privatisation of public services, but there’s one comfort, given the way the country is heading. At least our parliamentarians aren’t running the food banks.