Saturday, April 12, 2008 

Quote of the decade.

'We are pleased that the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal has agreed with our view and found that conditions in Iraq are such that an ordinary individual Iraqi civilian is not at serious risk from indiscriminate violence,' a spokesman for the Home Office said.

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Scum-watch: Our interpretation of the ECHR is selective.

As predicted yesterday:

We have grave misgivings, of course, about the European Convention on Human Rights. All too often it leads to putting the rights of terrorists ahead of those of the people of Britain.

The Sun is of course right. Only those truly deserving should be protected by the ECHR: soldiers, police officers, tabloid journalists, foreign media chief executives, etc.

Those clearly not deserving are asylum seekers. How dare they demand treatment on OUR national health service?

ANOTHER High Court decision yesterday is sure to raise the nation’s blood pressure.

A judge decided that 11,000 failed asylum seekers are entitled to free treatment on the National Health.

That’s despite the average waiting list for operations being on the rise. And despite the NHS being under strain with dirty wards and some old folk being underfed by nurses run off their feet.

Those who refuse to go to their home country after being refused asylum here should go somewhere else instead . . .

To the back of the NHS queue.


Typically, the Sun has wilfully misreported the actual ruling. It doesn't just affect failed asylum seekers; it affects all asylum seekers, including those who have been refused refugee status but have no safe passage home so cannot be deported. There's this completely not backed up by evidence statement too:

Many asylum-seekers enter Britain penniless as “health tourists” seeking costly HIV and Aids treatment.

And the natural comment from the Tory front flat tax backing "Taxpayers'" Alliance too:

Mark Wallace, of the Taxpayers’ Alliance, said: “We can’t pay for everyone who turns up on our doorstep.”

We're not you bumptious ignoramus, just for those who have not been refused permission to stay, and those who can't be returned in any case, which amounts to the 11,000 being quoted. How many of those will actually be seriously ill and require costly treatment will be a far smaller number. The greatest shame of this is that it still wouldn't have saved Ama Sumani.

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More on the Moorfield.

After this week's Ruth Fowler antics, it's a joy to read Marina Hyde on her usual top form:

At last, a solution to all this bourgeois anxiety about the environmental impact of travel: class tourism. You don't have to leave the house and you always end up feeling better about yourself. It has certainly seemed a viable alternative in recent weeks, as people have been able to observe the denizens of the West Yorkshire estate on which Shannon Matthews lived, and apply all sorts of labels - the most popular referencing Shameless, the television series by the award-winning writer Paul Abbott set on a fictional Manchester estate.

To read the papers since the arrest of Shannon's mother, Karen, has been to see Britain as a nation of Gillian McKeiths - completely ill-qualified to pass judgment, but keen to shriek in horror at how these people do live.


And for those whom have ironically forgiven Fowler because of her appearance - Ms Hyde is more than aesthetically pleasing without having to take photographs of her rump.

Hopi Sen also went through the history books to show that the horror in the press at the Moorfield estate is hardly a new occurrence, regardless of Allison Pearson's shock and romanticising of her own council estate upbringing, while Justin is sardonic as usual about the latest "revelations" concerning how awful Karen Matthews is. Also worth reading is yesterday's Grauniad dispatch which typically went deeper than the superficial disgust elsewhere:

And yesterday the place had its own "conflict tourists" - five women from Huddersfield with a toddler cuddled precariously (and illegally) on their Peugeot's back seat. "We're here for a nosey," said the driver, looking optimistically at the sort of everyday redbrick semis you see on the edge of any town in the north of England. "It is real rough, isn't it?"

Cunts.

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Friday, April 11, 2008 

Alton Indie.

The Independent has announced its new editor. This is the man, as described by Nick Davies in Flat Earth News:

Roger Alton has never claimed to be a political animal. His style is too intense, bordering on manic, at best full of charm, at worst eye-wateringly clumsy. His passions are far from government, much closer to sport and women, both of which he pursues with obsessive energy. In newspaper terms, he is a desk man, a brilliant subeditor who can project stories on a page, a good commissioner of interesting tales. But not political.

This was reflected in a story that went around the Observer newsroom after he was appointed editor in July 1998 and found himself being invited to Downing Street for a quiet chat with the prime minister. 'Fuck,' said Alton, who swears when he breathes. 'I can't meet the Prime Minister. I'm just a fucking sub.'

In his anxiety, so the story goes, he turned to the Observer's then political editor, Patrick Wintour, and persuaded him to come with him to help him handle the conversation. So it was that a few days later Alton turned up in Downing Street with Wintour by his side, and waited nervously outside the Prime Minister's study. David Miliband, then running the Prime Minister's policy unit, walked by and said hello to Wintour, who introduced him to his new editor.

'So, what sort of changes do you plan to make to the paper?' asked Miliband, who was evidently looking for some kind of political insight.

Totally bereft of an answer, Alton reverted to type, stammering: 'Bit more sex on the front page. More sport. That kind of thing.'

Whatever you think about the Independent, the one thing it certainly is in the UK newspaper market is unique. Its front page campaigning can at times seem odd in line with the other stories of the day that seem much more worthy, then on another it can capture the mood entirely, something that neither its old-broadsheet rivals or the tabloids, much more used to grabbing attention, manage to do.

The omens are certainly not good, as Alton's own comments today suggest:

The Independent will be neither a leftwing nor a rightwing paper under Roger Alton's stewardship, the incoming editor said today.

"Left and right are effectively meaningless terms now. I wouldn't define myself by those terms and I don't think a newspaper should either," Alton said.

"The great opening up of Britain during the past decade under New Labour wasn't a particularly leftwing or rightwing thing. It was a progressive thing to do," he said.

If the vacuity seems familiar, it's because Alton and his political editor at the Observer, Kamal Ahmed, grasping for an angle to impose on the paper, jumped on the Blairite bandwagon and even now seems not to have abandoned it just as it's gone out of fashion. While some of the allegations in FEN are disputed, what certainly isn't is Alton's influence in the Observer supporting the Iraq war, a mistake which it still can't be honest with itself about. That Alton has fallen for the biggest joke of them, that somehow left and right are now obsolete terms, something which only those devoted to the dead end of "radical centrism" or who aren't interested in politics still cling to, ought to suggest that he's not cut out for editing the Independent. While the Guardian might find the prospect of the Independent abandoning the left as a opportunity, for the British media to be even further distorted towards the right will do little for its vibrancy as a whole.

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Soldiers' rights act.

Human rights laws can be applied to British troops even in combat, a High Court judge has ruled.

The landmark judgement came in a test case relating to the death of Scottish soldier Pte Jason Smith in Iraq.

Mr Justice Collins said sending soldiers into action without proper kit could breach human rights. Ministers are appealing against the ruling.


Will the same tabloids that denounce the Human Rights Act as a charter for criminals and terrorists change their minds now that their heroes are being protected too, as they always should have been?

Is the Pope a protestant?

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An end to the conspiracies.

In a week in which other conspiracy theories were laid to rest, it's also time that the ones about July the 7th 2005 were as well. As Rachel reports from the trial of the three men accused of helping the 7/7 bombers stake out their targets:

For two years, conspiracy theorists have been saying there is no CCTV of the 7/7 bombers save one grainy shot, (which they say is faked). There is, I have seen it played in a public court. They could have seen it too, if they had bothered to come. It is real, it was always real. Why do they peddle their lies about it?

The defence are not contesting it; they are not contesting these facts - that Khan, Tanweer, Lindsey and Hussein set off with home made bombs and met up at Luton and took the bombs in rucksacks to London where they split up and detonated them as you have heard and people have seen. And felt, and died as a result of them.

I hope that this will be an end to this filthy lie. That the 7/7 bombers did not do it. I am weary of these lies after over two years of hearing them and seeing them spread on the internet.

Like with many other conspiracy theories, it will sadly take a lot more than such actual evidence to convince some otherwise.

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Scum-watch: Judges' blow to war on terror!

Speaking of making it up, you almost can't believe the level of bullshit in the Scum on yesterday's judges' decision that stopping the BAE SFO inquiry was unlawful:

Judges’ blow to war on terror

JUDGES yesterday said Tony Blair was wrong to protect a £43billion arms deal – even though he did it to prevent terror attacks.

Those liberal nancy fancy judges have only gone and hurt the "war on terror"! Naturally, nowhere in this account is it mentioned that the same man who made the threat to withdraw intelligence co-operation - an empty threat as the Saudi intelligence services not only had no intention of doing so, but also because they would never have stopped giving such information to the CIA, who would have immediately passed it on to MI5 - was the same Saudi prince that has allegedly received £1bn in payments through the al-Yamamah deal.

The ruling infuriated ministers and increased pressure on the SFO to reopen the case.

Well, if it did we certainly haven't heard from them, as they're keeping their silence up.

This might well also be the first and only time that the Sun defends blackmail in its leader column:

At stake was BAE’s sale of 72 Typhoon jets to the Saudis, a colossal export contract worth billions and securing many thousands of jobs.

Also at stake, more vitally, was our national security, put in jeopardy by Saudi threats of withdrawing their intelligence on terrorists.

Blair could have stood up to them. But at what cost?


Let me just attempt to get this straight. Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't we meant to be fighting a war against terrorism? Surely if a country then on such petty grounds as an investigation to corruption threatens our security through not passing on vital information, doesn't that make them an accomplice? Indeed, just today the brother of Kafeel Ahmed, the man who died from his injuries after attempting to blow up Glasgow airport with patio gas canisters and petrol was jailed for 18 months for not passing information to the police that would have helpful in their inquiries. As the judges said yesterday, if such a threat had been made by a citizen of this country, he would have been charged with attempting to pervert the course of justice. The Scum favours continuing arm deals to tyrants chiefly responsible for the spread of Wahhabism across the globe to the rule of law itself.

The High Court has ruled against the Government and the Serious Fraud Office on a point of principle.

Which is all very well.

But those judges won’t have to pick up the pieces if thousands lose their jobs or even their lives.


Ah, so it would be the judges' fault rather than the terrorists or the Saudis if an attack did happen as a result of the withdrawing of intelligence co-operation. Excellent reasoning and logic, but what else do you expect from a newspaper owned by the man who supported the Iraq war because of the myth of the $20 barrel of oil at the end of it? That the Saudis have been one of the chief beneficiaries of the oil price rise, enriching themselves and spending it on spreading Salafism while condemning their citizens to life in one of the most barbaric societies on the planet is neither here nor there.

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Churning, innit.

Do the "journalists" that bang out this complete and utter shit believe it themselves?

A TEENAGER called directory inquiries to book a taxi but ended up having a cabinet delivered – because she asked for a “cab, innit”.

The 19-year-old Londoner wanted a taxi to take her from her home to Bristol airport, and first asked for the number using the Cockney rhyming slang “Joe Baxi”.

When the baffled operator told her she could not find anyone listed by that name, the teen snapped back: “It ain’t a person, it’s a cab, innit.”

The operator then found the nearest cabinet shop, Displaysense, and put the girl through.

She then spoke to an equally bemused saleswoman and eventually fumed: “Look love, how hard is it? All I want is your cheapest cab, innit.

I need it for 10am. How much is it?”

The sales adviser said it would be £180 and the girl gave her address and paid with a credit card.


As anyone with more than 10 braincells will have realised, this is a PR puff piece turned into "news" by the Metro, Daily Mail and Ananova, while the above was in the Scum. It's almost believable - up until the marketing manager himself makes an appearance, ala Paul Hucker and Simon Burgess. The Churner Prize tracked down the actual press release that the hacks then constructed into a story from Displaysense's own website. 5CC called bullshit too.

Churnalism at its finest then, but most of the commenters on the Sun don't seem to have seen through it:

Bring back elocution lessons, & for those that don't know what they are, they are lessons to help one speak and pronounce words clearly and correctly eliminating all this "Ain't it" and "Ya get me" rubbish we hear everyday.


Sigh.

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Does my bum look big in this?

Yup, this really is one of the images of Fowler on her website.

Doctors hailed a medical breakthrough today after the first successful connection of the rectum to the throat and the throat to the rectum. The unusual surgery was helmed by Professor Scheissmund and performed on 29-year-old Ruth Fowler, a former stripper, globe-trotter and soon to be published author.

While Fowler herself is still recovering from the operation, Prof. Scheissmund gave the background on why Miss Fowler had wanted the surgery. "She felt that in line with her recent writing, castigating holier-than-thou bourgeois liberals while enjoying all the comforts of a bourgeois liberal and then fat people for being fat, the next logical step was to be able to perform in real life what she can so successfully achieve in prose. While it was not an everyday cosmetic request, we felt that we could pull it off and Ruth herself has already congratulated us on our work by thanking us out of her colon and then vomiting effluent into a bucket."

Fowler already has her next Comment is Free piece lined up, entitled "Talking out of your arse is more difficult than it looks."

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Thursday, April 10, 2008 

Contempt is a two-way street.

"Why do they hate us so much?" is one of those wails that occasionally wafts from Westminster and into the press, politicians and commentators alike wondering why our representatives are either spat on, denounced as all the same or just completely ignored. There is a good case for making that the vast majority of politicians are not in it for themselves, that they genuinely do believe in some tangible concepts, and that they serve us with a diligence which many of us ourselves could neither achieve nor would want to attempt to. Then there's days like today, when the case for the defence seems so utterly overwhelming.

As Mr Eugenides writes, it's almost as if Gordon Brown at the moment has a reverse midas touch, where everything he goes near suddenly turns to shit the moment he opens his mouth about it. Here's the former clunking fist, the man accused of being Stalin, and he's being repeatedly made to look as if he's like another fictional ruler, the emperor without any clothes, debasing himself in public in front of the baying and mocking crowds. Half of this is because of his scattergun approach: one day declaring that plastic bags will be banished because the Daily Mail's just started a campaign up about them, the next deciding that malaria is the world's most pressing issue. Tony Blair wasn't immune to this either, as anyone who can recall his plea for Coronation Street's Deirdre's miscarriage of justice to be rectified can testify. The power behind the throne then though was Alastair Campbell, who compared to Brown's current advisers and chief spin doctor Stephen Carter was a genius and rottweiler rolled into one. Where Blair's spin was assured, either because it was done so well, or because the media was still involved in its temporary love affair with New Labour, Brown's is fast becoming his biggest weakness and in danger of turning him into a laughing stock.

Yesterday's announcement that Brown wouldn't after all be attending the opening ceremony of the Olympics was seemingly designed, in light of the protests in London and his own failure to so much as touch the flame when it arrived in Downing Street while the Chinese shell-suit mafia obscured him from vision, to be a good news story. Prime minister does decent thing despite potential pitfall over Britain hosting the next games! Easily offended Chinese get political equivalent of blowing a raspberry! Strong-man Brown says no to human rights abusers! Only, the slightest deeper look at the story exposed it for the fraud that it was. Brown had never explicitly stated that he personally was going to attend the opening ceremony; rather, span Downing Street, he was only always going to attend the closing ceremony, so that the spirit of the Olympics could be passed on. In any case, Tessa Jowell, the truly hapless Olympics minister is still going to attend the opening ceremony, so there's not going to be any boycott of any sort whatsoever. Within minutes of Brown/his lackeys making the announcement on Channel 4 News the entire thing had fell apart. The Conservatives, already fusillading Brown with accusations of dithering have yet another weapon to use against him, while the public themselves, not to mention those whom the gesture was meant to please, just feel cheated and almost lied to.

A very different sort of contempt but still one which reverberates around the country was thrillingly and damningly exposed by
Lord Justice Moses and Lord Justice Sullivan in the Royal Courts of Justice. Although ostensibly the case brought by Corner House and CAAT was against the Serious Fraud Office's Robert Wardle after he caved into pressure from Downing Street and the Attorney General to drop the investigation into BAE's slush fund to the Saudis, this was a judgement that exposed the sham and sheer mendacity of Blair's government in its dying days. Prince Bandar, the man since revealed as receiving up to £1bn through the Al-Yamamah deal, waltzes into Downing Street, feeling the heat on the back of his neck because the SFO is close to accessing Swiss bank accounts that would confirm the allegations against BAE, and says that unless the investigation is abandoned, not only will the Saudis take their next big order of armaments elsewhere, but they'll also cut off diplomatic and intelligence relations. Instead of telling Bandar to get lost and take his blatant blackmail with him, Blair writes directly to Lord Goldsmith, who gives in and orders Wardle to drop the investigation.

It's worth quoting directly from the judgement, so sneering as it is of the government's action:
# The defendant in name, although in reality the Government, contends that the Director was entitled to surrender to the threat. The law is powerless to resist the specific and, as it turns out, successful attempt by a foreign government to pervert the course of justice in the United Kingdom, by causing the investigation to be halted. The court must, so it is argued, accept that whilst the threats and their consequences are "a matter of regret", they are a "part of life". (§ 6)

# So bleak a picture of the impotence of the law invites at least dismay, if not outrage. The danger of so heated a reaction is that it generates steam; this obscures the search for legal principle. The challenge, triggered by this application, is to identify a legal principle which may be deployed in defence of so blatant a threat. However abject the surrender to that threat, if there is no identifiable legal principle by which the threat may be resisted, then the court must itself acquiesce in the capitulation. (§ 7)

and
Had such a threat been made by one who was subject to the criminal law of this country, he would risk being charged with an attempt to pervert the course of justice. (§ 59

The rule of law is nothing if it fails to constrain overweening power.(§ 65)

The government's response to this tearing apart of its decision, this exposition of how they broke the rule of law itself so that one of the most vicious dictatorships on the planet could continue to be sold arms it doesn't need and so that its demagogic royal family can continue to receive vast payments courtesy of the UK taxpayer to be used on prostitutes, private jets and all the other trappings of unearned wealth while their own citizens are not even afforded the most basic of human rights? None. It's refused to comment. As has BAE, and the Serious Fraud Office itself, not to mention Prince Bandar. Perhaps it should be said that all those mainly involved have either gone or are about to go: Blair took Lord Goldsmith along with him, and Wardle himself is shortly to be replaced at the SFO. Even so, it doesn't slightly begin to justify the silence not just from the government, but from the Labour party as a entirety.

Dave Osler has already said this, but it's a point well worth repeating. This week much attention has been paid to events in Dewsbury, and discussion of whether the alleged abduction of Shannon Matthews was a scam from the very beginning. Her mother has been charged with perverting the course of justice, for not informing the police of all she knew and when she knew it. The government back in December 2006 did almost exactly the same thing, except on a scale completely alien to anyone in that part of Yorkshire. The difference is that Matthews is just a member of the underclass; Goldsmith and Blair were the land's highest legal adviser and the prime minister himself, yet they conspired to pervert the course of justice and in doing so broke the rule of law irrevocably. Some of those in Dewsbury have been warned not to take the law into their own hands as a response; who could possibly blame anyone for having complete contempt for the politicians responsible in this much larger and much graver case?

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Who's using whom?

I would be the one who puts the noose around the neck or presses the button for the lethal injection. And hangings should be public. People have stopped me and said they’re 100 per cent behind it.

This country is a terrifying place. No one is safe. I’m not ranting and raving. Come and sit here with us three and have the pain we’ve got. -- Probably not what Newlove said today, but what she has previously stated to the Sun.

The widow of Garry Newlove, the father of three who was murdered by a gang of drunken youths in front of his family, has agreed to help David Cameron draw up policies to strengthen families and tackle anti-social behaviour.

Helen Newlove will today appear at a Conservative Party summit to discuss ways of building more "responsible" communities and toughening Britain's criminal justice system.


Agreed to help dear old Dave draw up policies? Surely Cameron already knows what Newlove's demands are? After all, both he and Jack Straw met Newlove with the other "mothers in arms" to discuss how to solve "Broken Britain". Their 10 point plan was/is:

1 - Reintroduce the death penalty
2 - Set up compulsory DNA database

3 - Zero tolerance for minor crimes
4 - Repeal the Human Rights Act

5 - More bobbies on (blank) (presumably the beat?)
6 - Make parents responsible for their kids and restore discipline at home
7 - Victims' family's rights to be put above those of offenders with an end to ludicrous defences
8 - Juveniles to be named in court like adults

9 - Reserve plans to turn off street lights to save energy

10 - A crackdown on binge drinking

Some of these are already Conservative policy, with Cameron pledging to repeal the HRA and replace it with a "British" bill of rights, regardless of the fact that all that would mean in practise is that we'd have two tiers of law, with individuals still able to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights if their case was rejected under the "British" bill, just that it'd take hell of a lot longer than it current does. As much as a distinct minority in the Conservatives would like to reinstate the death penalty, that's something that simply isn't going to happen, and it'd be a major surprise if they suddenly decided after moving towards a more libertarian stance on civil liberties that a "compulsory" DNA database was a good idea. David Davis has talked of "zero tolerance" on occasion, but whether they would make it an actual policy or implement it when most of the police themselves despair of such a change, as they do of putting "more officers on the beat", which is about as blunt an instrument as you can use against crime, is also far from clear.

Quite how any government could force parents to "restore discipline" at home is an open question, and similarly daft is the idea that you can somehow exclude some legal defences because they're "ludicrous"; the answer to that is to impose harsher sentences for wasting the court's time and money when guilt is obvious. Courts already have the power to name juveniles if the judge decides that the crime is suitably heinous and that an example needs to be made, and the Conservatives have already announced that they would raise taxes on strong lagers and the so-called alcopops, something which hasn't been condemned with the same venom as Darling's across the board raising of duty in the budget even if it would have the same next to negligible effect.

The question then has to be exactly who is helping or using whom. Most of Newlove's demands are anathema even to the traditional hanging 'n' flogging party, and would move the country even further into the realm of authoritarianism. If Cameron is then cynically using a grieving widow when he has no intention of implementing her ideas, then even by his and the new Tory party's standards that's scraping the bottom of the public relations barrel. If Newlove is using Cameron however to panic Labour into coming down ever tougher on crime, something that it's more than happy to do at the proverbial dropping of a hat, then that's not much more devious. That Newlove's claim that the trial involving her husband's murderers was a "circus", where the defendants had the "human rights" (showing that despite her previously working in a court environment that she has no idea what human rights actually are outside a tabloid definition) on their side could not be less credible considering their conviction and sentencing suggests that despite the state bending over backwards to help her and all the sympathy she's quite rightly received, she has no interest whatsoever in compromise or rational debate. In time Newlove will like the other grieving mothers who demand change be forgotten, but for now those with their own agendas, even if more subtle than hers, are more than happy to associate with her and gain the short-lived kudos. Until then, it will remain difficult to comprehend just who is using whom.

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MurdochSpace.

In one of my irregular moments of madness some time ago, as any of you whom for some reason have searched for "septicisle" might know (41 people have so far this month, although 11 have also been referred here after they searched for "gay orgy", 2 were from "celebs with big foreheads", another 2 from "putting in a tampon", yet another 2 for "dont hit kids no seriously they have guns now", 1 from "gordon brown's student pamphlet 'how to sponge a living from state benefits'", 1 more from "my grief is killing me help me" and finally 1 from "cunts at jobcentre made me get a job at a care home which is unbearable") I made the stupid mistake of setting up a MurdochSpace page. For anyone wondering, yes, it's mine, and yes, you couldn't possibly have guessed that I looked like that, and yes, I realise this makes me the most horrendous hypocrite. Still, at least I'm not on Facebook.

If any of you are so inclined or dull enough to want me as a phony friend, feel free.

I get the feeling I'm going to regret this in the morning.

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Wednesday, April 09, 2008 

The right if difficult decision.

The appeal court judges have come to the right if difficult and strewn with problems ruling that Abu Qatada should not be deported back to Jordan. Before jumping on the the typical blaming of the Human Rights Act, it should be noted that the judges' decision was on the grounds that he would not receive a fair trial, not that he was at risk of personally being tortured or mistreated. No one might care if someone who produced fatwas used during the Algerian civil war to kill individuals declared suitably un-Islamic was tortured, but most of us do still care about whether someone receives a trial that doesn't have the appearance of resembling a kangaroo court.

The whole extended legal farce has been one idiocy followed by another. We know quite well that Qatada, much like Hamza and Bakri Mohammad, had at least some sort of relationship with the security services; how far it actually went, whether they were informing or whether there was some sort of pact by where they didn't call for attacks against this country in their preaching is much harder to ascertain. Bisher al-Rawi, formerly held at Guantanamo, was repatriated here because it emerged that he had in fact been helping MI5 all along keep tabs on Qatada, while Jamil el-Banna was approached and urged to become an intelligence asset shortly before he left for Gambia, where he and al-Rawi were subsequently arrested and rendered to Gitmo. Whether this is part of the reason why he has not been simply charged with inciting racial hatred like Hamza eventually was is unclear, but it seems that as with Bakri, the authorities have decided it's much easier to simply get rid of him than to try to build a case against him.

This is strange because despite the case against him in Jordan, it was his preaching here that undoubtedly has influenced some that have subsequently become suicide bombers or plotted terrorist attacks. Like with Hamza and Bakri, the services undoubtedly know what he was up to, and probably have tape after tape of his speeches, or at the very least intercepts of some of his telephone calls. While we simply can't know whether it would be possible to try Qatada here if intercept evidence was allowed in court, a ban that the head of the FBI recently denounced as "untenable", it's difficult to believe that if the government was truly exercised that it couldn't be able to build a viable case against him. Perhaps the difficulty is that unlike Hamza, the US doesn't seem to be making any efforts to attempt to extradite him, where he would undoubtedly face a far longer prison sentence than any he would ultimately face here. Even that isn't certain though, as although Qatada has never been personally linked to any plots here, those recently sentenced have faced sentences of over 20 years.

At the heart of the issue ought to be the acknowledgement that deporting anyone to a country that practises torture, and Jordan is certainly one, with Human Rights Watch only yesterday reporting that up until 2004 Jordan was one of the destinations for those who went through the rendition programme, and they weren't being sent there for the beautiful beaches and excellent prison facilities, ought to be the absolute last resort. Instead the government has used it as the very first resort. "Memorandums of understanding" that aren't worth the paper they're typed on are a ludicrous justification for doing something that we would have never have done prior to 9/11. Under Brown we've been told that despite what Blair said, the rules of the game haven't changed. They ought to prove it by doing the decent thing over Qatada.

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Mea culpa expanded.

I ought to be slightly clearer than I was in yesterday's "mea culpa" on Karen Matthews about exactly what it was I was apologising about, especially as two other bloggers I more than respect suggest I shouldn't have at all. I was not saying sorry for alleging snobbery; I think that claim still more than stands up for why there was far less coverage than that given to the Madeleine McCann case, although the factors of the difference in looks between Madeleine and Shannon and Kate and Karen were also a factor, as was that this was happening on a Yorkshire housing estate and not in sunny Praia da Luz in Portugal.

Rather, I was admitting I got it wrong directly by criticising Allison Pearson's original piece on the Matthews, especially her concluding paragraph:

But like too many of today's kids, Shannon Matthews was already a victim of a chaotic domestic situation, inflicted by parents on their innocent children, long before she vanished into the chill February night.

That seems more than accurate now. As noted at the time however, Pearson's hypocrisy was abject considering her repeated defences of the McCanns, and far more offensive was that Pearson, without any idea whatsoever about what had actually happened, was kicking a mother while she was down, with nothing to suggest that what had happened to Shannon was anything to do with her or her family at large. As it turns out, she might well have not been down at all; but her tearful appearances were, as Pearson herself writes today, incredibly convincing.

Pearson however has got the wrong end of the stick entirely here though:

After Shannon went missing, those of us who dared to question the family's way of life were pilloried. Apparently, we were middle-class snobs looking down on a poor, working-class world. Who were we to judge Karen with her seven kids from five different fathers?

That's not what I was arguing at all, although others might well have done. You can judge Matthews' lifestyle all you like, but if you must do it, do it after the girl had at least been found, either alive or dead. Pearson's original attack was humbug of the highest order, jumping to conclusions and making allegations which she could not possibly back up, purely on the back of Matthews' past sex-life and the children that had came with it. There's nothing more unpleasant that attacking someone while they're under such apparent pain, and Pearson herself had vigorously attacked those that had done the same with the McCanns.

Pearson continues:

Yet the more we learned about Shannon's family, the more the tangled roots of the little girl's unhappiness were cruelly exposed.

No one is supposed to be "judgmental" any more. But isn't it the failure to be judgmental that has created the chaotic world where a nine-year-old can (allegedly) be taken by the child-abusing uncle of her mum's toyboy? An uncle, by the way, with whom the mum herself is alleged to be having an affair. I know it's hard, madam, but do try to keep up at the back!


But again, Pearson hasn't got the faintest idea whether these allegations are true or not. I can't recall reading anything that suggested that the uncle was a child-abuser, although his reasons for snatching a girl would suggest that, if we're still meant to think that this was a snatching and not an elaborate scam, and the same goes for the way she's now suggesting that the uncle of Matthews' current lover was having an affair with her all along, something she cannot possibly prove and that which would affect the subsequent trial in any case. All this speculation and finger-pointing is doubtless the exact reason why the police have asked those on the Dewsbury estate not to take the law into their own hands, especially when they haven't got a clue of the actual facts themselves with all the rumours swirling around. If you're going to be judgemental, then at least have all the details laid out before you; if Pearson was going to do that however, she'd never get a column written at all. Part of this is churnalism, but part of it is also simply that the whole point of tabloid columnists is to be opinionated without necessarily having the slightest actual information to be able to back up why they have that view.

The same mentality is behind the current grasping of Shameless as the template for the entire estate on which the Matthews lived. The churnalism behind this is covered by the Churner Prize, a new blog that seems to be more than worth watching, but it's also because everything has now suddenly flipped in the media's mind. They weren't keen on the estate or the Matthews to begin with, but now they feel they've been taken for a ride, and the public themselves will feel the same, so they're justified in throwing around the epithets, no matter how potentially insulting or untrue. The Scum runs with this for example, and uses the example of a man saying the police found pornography in his house and that everyone has it as evidence of moral deprivation. That if he had copies of the Sun he'd have soft pornography in it as well doesn't seem worth mentioning. I've can't say I've ever watched a full episode of Shameless, but have caught glimpses, so someone can correct me if they need to, but if the show does at times feature the community itself coming together in times of need then that's been reflected in reality without the media bothering to draw that conclusion. The estate was completely behind the family and united in such a way that might not have previously been achieved, going out of their way to search and help in any way they could, ready to hold a party to welcome Shannon back, one which has sadly not been held. That however might be to give the impression that the under/working class aren't revolting, and we couldn't possibly have that.

I'm not afraid to admit however that I did get it wrong. A mother seems to have abandoned her child for whatever reason, and her family life was by no means above reproach. I should perhaps have moderated my view slightly by admitting the possibility of the truth of what Pearson wrote. This doesn't change one iota however the fact that Pearson is a snobbish cunt of the highest order, as proved by her diatribe against Fiona MacKeown, simply for not having the same standards as the high and mighty little Miss Perfect Middle Class Pearson. If there's one thing I do know, it's that I'd rather be wrong and mistaken than a despicable, sniping, unbearably cruel bitch.

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Tory wolf in Labour clothing part two.

This letter in today's Grauniad says everything my post yesterday failed miserably to do:

Both my husband and I are to have our income reduced due to the removal of the 10p tax rate. I am disabled and receive incapacity benefit and an occupational pension (both taxed). My husband works full time for a low wage. He hasn't had a pay increase in nine years. Our children are grown up and we are below pension age. We are not entitled to tax credits. We are on the brink of poverty. And this from a so-called Labour government. I despair.

Josette Morgan
, Potton, Bedfordshire

Justin has more of much the same.

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Ruth Fowler cries for help.

Despite 29 years of attempting to find herself, Ruth Fowler is still in a desperate situation. The toll of travelling the globe has not been kind, and she finds herself increasingly facing up to life in the company of stereotypical, cliched, bourgeois liberals, who when not protesting for vegetable rights and peace are extolling the virtues of living on air for a year, ensuring that their farts are carbon neutral, and generally acting like men of straw.

You can help Ruth in her dire hour of need.

Just a pound a month will add to her ability to meet thrusting go-getting right-wingers in either New York or London, whichever she's currently in.

£10 a month will mean she can send the money directly on to an actual charity, therefore negating her need to whine about her friends that are doing something for charity while she doesn't feel the need to.

£140,000 a year will buy her a column in the Daily Mail, where they tend to like articles which are nonsensical and bash imaginary liberals that don't exist anywhere outside Metropolitan areas that the media are obsessed with.

Please give generously.

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Tuesday, April 08, 2008 

Mea culpa.

While there's obviously still an awful lot to come out and you're innocent until proven guilty, I feel just slightly silly having wrote a few defences of Karen Matthews over the last month or so. While most of the bile in the tabloids was directed at Fiona MacKeown, it's hard not to accept now that Allison Pearson might have had something of a point in her 5th of March piece, hypocrisy or not.

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Beware the Tory wolf in Labour clothing.

Beware the lesson of the Tory wolf in liberal clothing, writes La Toynbee. As it happens, she's talking about how the centre-right in Sweden, after getting into power on a programme of policies not much different to that of the centre-left, have turned out to be rather more right-wing than they promised, the implication being that no one must vote for that nice Mr Cameron, as despite his message, he'll undo all of Labour's hard work in abolishing poverty and establishing total equality.

I exaggerate slightly. The headline could however just as easily be about Brown. Toynbee strangely doesn't mention in her column something rather more important to the average low-paid worker who's most likely to actually vote Labour, but Brown could be that Tory wolf in Labour clothing. What else to say of someone who, through abolishing the 10p starting rate of tax, has just redistributed mainly from single workers without children earning under £18,500 to those earning over £35,000 a year, who gain under the tax changes introduced in his last budget?

It's important to set the background to how this change came about. This was back shortly before Brown was to inherit the Earth - or at least the Labour party leadership. His stewardship of the economy was not yet as threatened or criticised as it is now, but it was starting to come under some strain, and he didn't have much room for manoeuvre. He needed something that would grab the headlines, but that wouldn't smack the most crucial constituencies, the cliched hard-working families, pensioners, or the City. It might not have had anything to do with it, but the weekend before a number of newspapers called for tax cuts, with the News of the Screws almost begging for some sort of slash. The 10p top rate, introduced by Brown himself some years previously, was the obvious contender. The reasoning was that due to the introduction of tax credits, those on low pay who would have otherwise have been whacked had something of a fall-back, while the only real major losers would be those under 25 without children who couldn't claim them and part-timers who didn't work enough hours to qualify.

The signs that this wasn't thought through properly, or that it was, and Labour either didn't care or thought that the majority wouldn't care, are fairly clear. If there's one thing that New Labour has always been aware of, it's the polls, and time after time they show that around the only remaining demographic that supports the party consistently and in spite of everything is the 18-24-year-olds. How could they have not noticed it regressively targets them if the Treasury hadn't been frantically searching for the proverbial rabbit to pull out of the hat?

Regardless of that, the giving with one hand and taking away with another didn't fool hardly anyone else in any case. The most grateful headline the budget received was the Sun's "reasons 2p cheerful", which was rather mitigated against by the following day's headlines elsewhere on Brown's "tax con". Questions have been asked of why the Labour MPs now concerned and angry about the change didn't recognise it sooner and speak up - the reason why they didn't because at the time they didn't care as they had no reason to think it was going to affect them personally. Even if the local elections were coming up again, the losses were thought unlikely to be as severe as previously, especially considering Blair was on his way out and acting as a lightning conductor for discontent. With him gone, Brown was bound to re-energize the party and re-engage with the public itself. This was exactly what happened - until the Northern Rock crisis broke out, Brown fluffed his opportunity to call the election last autumn, and the economic weather significantly turned with the credit crunch, still now reverberating and having a chilling affect across the board.

Backbench MPs are concerned now because a tax change they thought they could bluff their way through has come home to roost. However much the Supreme Leader and Alastair Darling chunter about how we're in an excellent position to deal with the lack of liquidity in the financial markets, with inflation low, the lowest paid are the ones feeling the pain of the price of food especially rising. Then, just as things are getting worse, they get further stabbed in the back by Labour taking away the 10p rate. Taking into conjunction with other matters that Labour has dismissed or poo-pooed, such as the closing of post offices and now the most dramatic fall in house prices since the dark days of 1992, and it's little wonder that the Labour MPs are so worried. Even though the Conservatives continue to offer very little of any substance or great difference, they see the upcoming local elections as the precipice they may be about to fall off. They remember the almost wiping out of Tory councils back in the local elections of the mid-90s, and fear it's about to happen to them. The only major council Labour still controls in the south outside London is Reading - and it's under great pressure.

This was not how it was supposed to happen. If Brown had gone for the election back in October, then Labour would now most likely still be in power, albeit with probably a further reduced majority, and while all the above issues would be of concern, they'd have the four or five years to once again turn it around. Instead Labour is increasingly hemmed in from all sides, but Brown himself doesn't either seem to recognise this, or if he has, he's not showing it. I personally couldn't care less about house prices falling, especially seeing if I'm ever going to be able buy one at some point in the future they're going to have to drop a lot further, but when it's possibly the number one issue for the middle classes it seems to be asking for it to refer to the drop as "containable". That doesn't even come close to the apparent contempt he feels for the very individuals he's shafted with the removal of 10p rate however, who have to realise that he's taking the "difficult long-term decisions" and that in a few months they'll see the results - I'm sure they'll appreciate that when their pay-checks come in.

Quite why the Labour MPs are complaining however, as opposed to why are they complaining
now is the better question. It's with a piece of everything else Labour has done of late. When John Hutton does the greed is good routine just as the banking sector has brought the Western economy to its knees, when concessions over the non-doms are made almost as soon as the City howls, when Caroline Flint continues to spout about evicting those on benefits from council houses and when the entire cabinet seems to have decided to out Blairite the worst excesses of the Blair years across the board, they ought to have realised by now that Labour stopped caring about its base a long time ago. Instead of letting them eat cake it urges them to eat tax credits, even if they mask the problem rather than anywhere near address it, are incredibly difficult to claim in the first place and there continues to be huge problems in the administering of the scheme, leading to both under and over payments. Rather than offering the change he promised, Brown has been a continuation of the same without the undoubted political nous which Blair had. You might remember that David Miliband said on Question Time that a year into a Brown prime ministership some might feel nostalgic for Blair and want him back; someone more perceptive might have instead said that a year in and everyone would be saying that nothing had changed. The "tragedy" has been that they would have been proved right.

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Scum-watch: Defending China by proxy.

As periodically occurs, mostly on special occasions or holidays, the Sun's slightly altered its logo. This one however is especially intriguing:

Looks like someone's decided that the Olympic torch relay needs defending. I wonder who that could possibly be?

The tone for this defence of the ancient right to run a flaming stick through capital cities is set by the Sun's report on the protests yesterday in Paris:

THE Olympic torch was snuffed out four times yesterday as it was relayed through Paris – before eventually being put on a BUS to shield it from anti-Chinese mobs.

Anti-Chinese mobs. Not human rights protesters or Free Tibet campaigners, but anti-Chinese mobs.

In a futile effort to keep some semblance of balance, there is a column at the side dealing with the accusations against China, but perhaps there's something in the fact that it leads with how China executes 22 a day. This is after all the newspaper that recently declared that 99% of its readers wanted the death penalty brought back. It's nearly 300 words in before the Sun finally suggests why the protests have been so vociferous:

Protesters are furious at China’s brutal crushing of opponents in Tibet, which has sparked outrage in neighbouring countries including Nepal.

But wait! Aren't the protests themselves incompatible with the values of the Olympics?

International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge blasted the protests as “not compatible with the values of the torch relay or the Olympic Games”.

He insisted of China’s human rights record: “The International Olympic Committee has expressed its serious concern and calls for a rapid, peaceful resolution in Tibet.”


What values exactly does the torch relay represent? The values of public relations, of self-promotion, for both China and the celebrities/athletes that have carried it, of being completely impervious to criticism? It must be, because it certainly doesn't stand for peace, friendship or unity like the Sun claimed yesterday. It instead stands this time round for imperial arrogance, both on the part of the International Olympic Committee for awarding China the games in the first place and then condemning protesters despite China making no effort whatsoever to improve its rights record as it was supposed to do; and also China's own, in attempting to milk the Olympics for all its short-term worth, completely out of line with the supposed values of the games that it is meant to be espousing. Rather than just expressing vague calls for "a rapid, peaceful resolution in Tibet", it should be demanding at the very least that China meets with the Dalai Lama, puts a stop to its ridiculous claims that he's somehow masterminding the protests, and release those that have been taken into custody since the outbreak of the uprisings last month. For those who call for a separation of sport and politics, the moment the IOC gave China the Olympics it was a vote of confidence for its leadership; the two are so intertwined as to be impossible to break apart.

To further labour the point, the Sun's printed a cut out Olympic flame for everyone!

NO matter how many times protesters put out the real Olympic torch, they won't be able to extinguish our special cut-out-and-keep Olympic torch. Click HERE for your very own flame.

The leader column provides for two opportunities: to bash the French and to show the Chinese that Murdoch is firmly behind them and their two-week long sports extravaganza.

IF France fielded as many troops in Afghanistan as cops deployed on the streets of Paris yesterday, the Taliban could be defeated overnight.

If they were prepared to fight.


I realise this is a throw-away jibe, but the idea that somehow an extra 3,000 troops would "defeat the Taliban" is about as much of a fantasy as, oh, this very editorial.

Coachloads of club-carrying police were drafted in to protect the Olympic torch and keep unarmed civilian protesters at bay.

And they still couldn’t keep this iconic symbol alight.

Well, what do you expect? They're French, they're too busy eating snails, riding bicycles and going on strike as to do something as simple as keep an "iconic symbol" alight.

The flame was snuffed out FOUR times as it made its faltering way to Beijing — not by demonstrators but by city officials.

Finally, it was put on a bus for “safety reasons” — even though there was no more violence in Paris than in London, where the flame survived without a flicker.


Err, could this possibly be because, like in London, demonstrators were at certain sections blocking the flame's path? No, it's all the fault of those swarthy French policemen.

There is widespread sympathy for the Free Tibet campaigners dogging the flame’s journey — at huge loss of face to China’s Communist regime.

But this is supposed to be the Eternal Flame, an international symbol of the sporting ideal.


Not to break Godwin's law or anything, but as others have noted (The Times itself won't be repeating Jenkins's arguments, that's for sure), it was the Nazis that came up with the idea for a torch relay. The Eternal Flame - the Eternal Jew, anyone? Even if it was this imaginary symbol of a sporting ideal as some appear to be arguing, China's appropriation of it has snuffed them.

The countries through which it passes owe a duty to the Olympic legacy to keep it burning.

The French should have guarded it properly or had nothing to do with it at all.


Surely by "Olympic legacy" the Sun really means "the Chinese", or as they're known to Mr Murdoch, some of my closest business associates? As for the perfidious French, it should be interesting to see if the Sun condemns the Americans so noisily and angrily if the protesters there continue to succeed as their counterparts have here and in France. Somehow I think they might just be treated to a different standard.

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Monday, April 07, 2008 

Teeth-gnawing tedium.

It's nice to be proved wrong:

Diana, Princess of Wales, and Dodi Fayed were unlawfully killed by the reckless driving of their chauffeur, Henri Paul, and the paparazzi who chased them, jurors in the inquest into their deaths decided today.

The verdict, by a nine-to-two majority, brings to a close a six-month inquest that has heard from more than 240 witnesses and is expected to have cost more than £10m.

The verdict implicates the paparazzi and Paul much more so than previous investigations.


Contrary to Fayed's statement, the jury has once again indicted his own employee, Henri Paul, as one of those responsible for Diana and Dodi's death. His lawyers also abandoned his arguments at the close, something that previously couldn't be reported. Despite his contention in the witness box that he would accept the verdict of the jury, he's tonight consulting his lawyers over yet another further appeal, on the spurious grounds that because the Duke of Edinburgh and some other figures weren't forced to appear that not all the evidence was heard. £10 million down the drain; how much would it have cost to give him that passport again?

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A celebration of the Olympic spirit.

There's nothing quite like a protest against a vicious kleptocracy to bring out the best in everyone.

The official view of yesterday's relay, expressed by government ministers and torchbearers alike, seems to be that the halting passage through London was a "triumph for democracy", a kind of demonstration to the world of how free speech should be allowed. What nonsense. I was reporting yesterday's protests for the Guardian and, from the outset, police identified anti-Chinese protesters and subjected them to different rules to red-flag waving spectators.

Before the relay had even properly begun, my colleague witnessed police removing T-shirts and flags from demonstrators. At Ladbroke Grove, spectators carrying Tibetan flags were relegated to a pavement across the road, kept apart from a carnival-style reception.

It was the same story at Bloomsbury Square, which, along with Whitehall, was the most heated part of the relay. Several protesters were dragged away. I saw one woman asked to place her anti-Chinese posters in plastic bags. She told me she had been told by two officers that her materials, which complained about China's treatment of animals, were "inflammatory".

Demonstrators who did not obey police requests to stand in designated areas were repeatedly threatened with anti-terrorist legislation. On what grounds?

Police were also restrictive towards the press. I was threatened with arrest several times - for indiscretions such as having one foot on pavement and another, dreadful as it sounds, on the road. Jim Jameson, a freelance photographer, told me he was "thrown to the ground" while photographing an arrest near Whitehall.


If you wanted to be slightly glib, you could draw parallels with a protest that the police decided not to interfere with, where similarly inflammatory slogans were shouted and on clear display:

Then though it was just the whole country and freedom of speech which was being abused, whereas yesterday it was the Chinese, who are notoriously easily offended.

Then via Justin we have the athletes themselves:

Duncan Goodhew, the former Olympic swimmer who ran with the torch, said: "It shows how extreme things can get in this country and it's a great shame. It's such a bad example for children.

Quite so. Children seeing adults protesting against a PR operation by a tyrannical human rights abuser? Might give them ideas above their station, what?

We also have the pleasure of the Murdoch press having to tie itself in knots, not able to be too critical because of News Corporation's business interests in the country, which leads to the publication of garbage such as today's Sun leader, hilariously titled Freedom wins:

THE Olympic torch’s troubled journey across London was a triumph for democracy.

We are lucky to live in a country that values its citizens’ right to hold lawful, peaceful public protests.


Or at least in a country where the police abitrarily decide the definition of what a lawful, peaceful protest is. Or where the Sun decides what a lawful, peaceful protest is.

And police must be congratulated for their skill in allowing that to happen while preventing those with unlawful intentions from putting the flame out or injuring torch bearers.

Yes, congratulations to the Plod. You've set a wonderful precedent for protecting all other countries that want to run a glorified relay through the streets of London, regardless of their internal politics.

As holders of the next Games in 2012, Britain was right to show solidarity with the Olympic movement by allowing the flame to be paraded on our soil.

By "Olympic movement" the Sun presumably means the Chinese government, which allows its glorious proprietor to beam his wonderful satellite television service into millions of homes. Not to mention MySpace China, ran by the gorgeous pouting Wendi Deng, who just happens to be, err, Murdoch's wife.

Protesters claim it gave China a propaganda victory.

But our Prime Minister repeatedly warns China about its human rights record. Only yesterday Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell publicly condemned it as “reprehensible”.


Golly! Repeatedly warned! That's socking it to them. I bet they're quivering in their jackboots in Tibet now that Brown has "warned" them. No more shooting into crowds now lads, Gordon 'n' Tessa will give us a stern ticking off if we do!

What’s more, Gordon Brown will show his personal support for Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, by meeting him when he visits Britain next month.

Only after he was pressured into doing so by David Cameron raising it as an issue at Prime Minister's Questions. He won't however, unlike some on the continent, boycott the opening ceremony, which would hurt and embarrass China far more than anything else.

The flame is not a symbol of China. It’s an Olympic symbol.

Of course. The Chinese bodyguards that surrounded it were also obviously an Olympic symbol.

It represents peace, friendship and unity. Which makes it all the more poignant that the protesters could not extinguish it.

This leader represents obfuscation, sycophancy and not rocking the boat. Which makes it all the more poignant that the protesters for once cut through the layers of bullshit that often surround every political issue, and have continued to do so today.

Tygerland has a slightly more nuanced view.

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Same old Tories, always spamming.

Like everyone else, I'm the regular recipient of emails advising me that my pathetically average penis can be magically enlarged in both girth and length via pumps/pills/injections/the power of the mind/weights/specialist DVDs/Peregrine Worsthorne. It's not often however that I get spam from the Conservative party. In fact, it's the first time:

Football clubs can transform young lives

Hey there,

David Cameron recently visited a school in Dudley, where Wolverhampton Wanderers are offering young people the chance to improve their football skills, while also teaching them life skills. It’s a really good example of the huge ability a football club has to use its brand and its people to transform young lives.

There is much debate on how to get children off the streets and into doing something positive for themselves and their local communities. It’s a great 2 minute video that demonstrates local private firms (such as football clubs) aiding and enabling youngsters to meet and socialise constructively.

This footage is available at (link removed) it is available for you to embed on your blog Obsolete, if you wish. The embed code is available on the video player in the bottom right symbolized ‘<>’ –

I hope you can spread the debate.

Thanks for your time.

Kind Regards,

Graham

Digital Communications Officer |

Conservative Campaign HQ | 30 Millbank | London | SW1P 4DP |

Tel: 020 7984 8081 |

This email and any attachments to it (the "Email") are intended for a specific recipient(s) and its contents may be confidential, privileged and/or otherwise protected by law. If you are not the intended recipient or have received this Email in error, please notify the sender immediately by telephone or email, and delete it from your records. You must not disclose, distribute, copy or otherwise use this Email. Please note that email is not a secure form of communication and that the Conservative Party ("the Party") is not responsible for loss arising from viruses contained in this Email nor any loss arising from its receipt or use. Any opinion expressed in this Email is not necessarily that of the Party and may be personal to the sender.

Join us and make change happen – www.conservatives.com/join/

Promoted by Alan Mabbutt on behalf of the Conservative Party, both at 30 Millbank, London, SW1P 4DP

Now, I have received a few unsolicited invitations to link to videos before, from Vice magazine, but that was on a documentary they had made in North Korea, which at least had the potential to be somewhat interesting, even though I didn't link to it. I'm not on any Conservative mailing lists to be forwarded their press releases, so I was a little miffed when this floated in. One would have thought that I'm hardly going to be receptive to the Tories' propaganda, but then maybe this suggests that they're getting truly desperate. A little consultation with some fellow bloggers confirmed that they hadn't received this, so it's not a mass mail-out. Not to come over all self-pitying, but why little old me?

Still, I'm sure that Graham "Hardly" Wild will appreciate that I took the time and effort to reply to his due diligence by "spreading the debate":

I consider this unsolicited spam and would be grateful if you fucked right off.

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Saying your prayers part two.

Remember the bus driver that ordered his passengers off his bus so he should pray? Via 5cc, the bus company has completed its investigation into what actually happened:

A BUS company has defended its Muslim driver who stunned passengers by asking them to get off before kneeling down to pray.

London United Busways say they have carried out a full investigation after driver Arunas Raulynaitis rolled out his prayer mat to perform his daily prayers, facing Mecca on the number 81 bus in Langley.

Bosses have analysed evidence, including CCTV footage, and say the driver was actually on his 10-minute break when the incident took place at around 1.30pm on Thursday.

They added that the control room had in fact radioed Mr Raulynaitis to terminate the bus outside Langley Fire Station in London Road because it was running late due to road works. Passengers were asked to leave the vehicle while they waited for another bus to pick them up to complete their journey.

There is a discrepancy here between the passengers, who seem to say that they in fact had to wait 15 minutes for the bus that had supposedly caught up to pick them up, and the company, but I can't see why the company would lie about how they had cancelled the service. I also can't fathom why it would have gone to such lengths to defend its driver when it could have quite easily sacked him for his conduct if what the Sun and the others had alleged was true. The explanation also ties in with what the driver originally told the Sun:

Yesterday the driver, who said his name was Hrun, told The Sun: “I asked everyone to get off because I needed to pray. I was running late and had not had time."

The driver shouldn't perhaps have ordered everyone off; he could have quite easily prayed with them all still on and in the warm, even if it would have been odd, even if not as odd as ordering them off so he could pray.

As 5cc argues though, this is just another case where something that has a grain of truth in it is distorted out of all proportion and used to bash a community or a religion as a whole. Even now the usual "clash of civilisations" crowd is out on the Slough Observer article, something to be expected, as the usual right-wing blogs had linked to the story originally. The ones who spout "Dhimmitude" are left looking like dummies, but that's never stopped them before.

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A role model? No, she's a porker!

We have a new entry in the Daily Mail "cunt of the year" awards, via Anton Vowl:

A role model for ordinary women? No, Miss England finalist is fat, lazy and a poster girl for ill health

Chloe Marshall has caused a storm by becoming the first size 16 beauty queen to reach the finals of the Miss England contest.

Feted and fawned over for her courage in daring to break the mould, Chloe boasts she wants to be an "ambassador for curves".

Who on earth does she think she's kidding? What she's demonstrating isn't bravery but a shocking lack of self-control.

Instead of flaunting her figure, Chloe ought to own up to the truth. She is fat and she got that way by over-eating.

And so it continues, in a classic piece of Glenda Slaggery. The author responsible for this bile is Monica Grenfell, who belongs to that special band of bullshit merchants and snake-oil salesmen known as "nutritionists". Like most of them, it appears that she has no actual qualifications (she certainly doesn't mention any on her site) that would justify her genuinely calling herself a "nutritionist", and as nutritionist is not a protected term in this country, unlike dietician, she can call herself one without any potential for backlash, similarly to how "Dr" Gillian McKeith continues to call herself one.

Grenfell says approaching the end:

Teenage girls aren't in danger of falling victim to an epidemic of anorexia - but of obesity.

The much-vaunted size zero of catwalk models is actually a UK size four. How many girls do you know that size?

The number of women in this country who are seriously underweight is minute around one in 70.


Which is probably true. It is however also completely irrelevant. Women's magazines don't, or very, very rarely trumpet women the size of Marshall as role models. Instead they present celebrities and models who one week are getting fat and the next week are too skinny, or at least according to the celeb mags, as the body image that should be aspired too. It's the exact same sort of poison that Grenfell preaches, without the slightest care for how this makes women who don't fit the mould feel. Indeed, if women stopped being concerned about how they're "overweight" as Marshall supposedly is, then Grenfell and her colleagues would be out of a job. They have an interest in continuing to treat those who don't fit their model as "lazy" and "poster models" for ill-health.

All of this though is to again judge and pre-judge by what someone looks like. Coming from someone not renowned for his stunning good-looks, this might be a little twee and self-serving, but it's always what's inside that counts. Compare what Grenfell thinks to what she quotes Marshall as saying:

She talks about the "skinny minnies" she'll be competing against. "All I wanted to do by entering this pageant was to send a message out to young girls that it is fine NOT to be a size zero."

Game, set and match to Marshall, and "love" to the cunt Grenfell.

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