UPDATE
Feeling much better now. Many thanks for the many kind – and often very wise – comments. I know why I can’t sleep, why can’t you lot?
I hate being away from Nadira for lengthy periods and am not well equipped to pass the small hours alone. Still feeling an immense frustration that truly evil men like Blair prosper, but that has been part of the human condition forever. Oh well – really must try and get some sleep now, it’s 5am here,.
Regular readers of this blog know that I am a manic depressive and sometimes feel almost suicidal, Don’t worry, I have three wonderful children and I am not going to leave them. But I feel so weak this evening. compared to the strength of the forces of evil, if you describe evil as illegal war and the massive profits to be made from waging it, and the sunsequent looting of resources.
I hope that those who saw Sir Michael Wood’s evidence to the Chilcot Inquiry today, and who have also read Murder in Samarkand, feel that I painted an accurate pen-portrait of my once friend.
I felt that Michael had stabbed me in the back by refusing to back me in saying unequivocally that intelligence from torture was illegal.
I did not know that, exactly at that time, he was engaged in a heroic struggle to try to stop the war in Iraq on legal grounds, and that he had drawn the full fury of Blair and Straw. He could not afford to open a second front on extraordinary rendition.
I have been struggling ever since to come to terms with what I saw as his going along with torture. I misjudged him.
But the way that the evil people like Blair and Straw manage to split decent people like Michael and me, is the lesson to avoid in future. Why is it that people like Michael, Elizabeth Wilmshurst, Bill Patey and I never managed to get together? (Bill Patey was the head of the FCO geographical department which included Iraq, and he, like very many others in the system, never believed the “Evidence” on Iraqi WMD.)
I am feeling so sad because different ways of trying to resist took us down different paths, and perhaps I am sad because I was harsher on some than they deserved.
But I am most sad because hundreds of thousands died so Blair and Straw could earn their lucrative standing in the USA. I feel nothing but despair.
Craig – Thanks for the update, that appeared to have been a dark night of the soul for you.
I have had a few dark nights too, but have to console myself with a reminder that I didn’t invent the system. These are strange and terrible times. My old man told me the other day that, back in the 1960s when I was born, he thought that I’d grow up into an age where we would all have a life of wondrous opportunity, immense wealth and a great amount of time to devote to interests, learning and leisure. As a scientist, he thought technology would take on in leaps and bounds, and benefit mankind in ways they could not begin to imagine.
Oh my. We’ve really missed a shockingly good opportunity.
It feeds the military industrial complex…
http://tinyurl.com/yfmsakc
Whilst this is totally off topic, before and maybe instead of seeing Avatar in 3D, or after, if you want to find out how beautiful our planet really is, instead of someone else’s imagination of another planet, go to your local swimming pool and learn how to scuba dive.
It is incredibly easy if you can maintain your self control and not panic – even if you are a poor swimmer with a muscular problem as I am.
And then go diving in Israel or Sharm-el-Sheikh or the Indian or the Caribbean Oceans.
No I haven’t been to Israel, but I have been to Sharm-el-Sheikh and whilst I didn’t like the place too much, the snokelling and diving is nearly as good as the Maldives.
Do it in 3D for Real
If I can do it anyone can, and I didn’t start till I was 46 years old.
Tony
Tony
http://tinyurl.com/m948n7
I don’t agree with keeping any animal caged. It is a crime and very cruel…
glenn,
“My old man told me the other day that, back in the 1960s when I was born, he thought that I’d grow up into an age where we would all have a life of wondrous opportunity, immense wealth and a great amount of time to devote to interests, learning and leisure. As a scientist, he thought technology would take on in leaps and bounds, and benefit mankind in ways they could not begin to imagine.”
I thought the same thing.
Both your old man and me were technically correct and still are, apart from the fact of the controlling elite, couldn’t work out a way of fairly sharing out the planets resources and for them still to have a role to do. Their only reason they think they exist is to control others, they think are less intelligent than they are. They think it gives them pleasure like riding a Triumph 650 for the first time.
We do not have to do all this war stuff, to control and kill people.
In fact we do not even have to work that hard.
Most people in this country do jobs that would be unnecessary, in a well designed system.
All you need to survive, is a reliable supply of food, water, energy & shelter
All these things are abundant on our planet. Not only that, but most of the work involved with supplying these basic necessities to sustain life can be done by automated machine and in a way that pollution is at far lower levels than is current.
But the idiots in control are the same as the religionists. Their entire philosophy of control is based on the World as it was 2,000 years ago, or even 100 years ago
So they produce all these meaningless jobs of feeding the machine like a hamster in a cage on a hamsterwheel.
And we get so frustrated of doing these meaningless stupid jobs that we rebel by writing grafitti on the walls, and we get arrested and then we clean it up and we fight and get ill and we need an army of policeman and doctors and nurses and lawyers and people to put us in jail and mental hospitals and dream up ways of occupational therapy so that we will be happy, instead of exhibiting our
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE
But if you want to, you can just ignore the cunts and just fucking do it.
You probably only have one life.
Throw your computer and tv in the bin, and go down your local swimming pool and learn to swim.
Then get out and live your life.
Tony
Bless you Craig.
Bless you Craig for being an honest, decent man who stands up and speaks out against this devastatingly evil regime under which we’ve all suffered for nigh on 13 years.
Those of us who understand and stand against this evil are normal, emotionally healthy human beings. We stand against a joint and individual psychopathy which is so sick that it cannot see its own illness and dysfunctions.
Believe it or not, it is NORMAL to feel the level of deepest despair that you go through. It’s not only normal, it’s HEALTHY. It’s healthy to register and react to untrammelled abuse.
Please, please just be very conscious that you are certainly not alone in your suffering. It may be of some comfort. Those of us who suffer similarly most often feel so isolated and alone.
We’re not. There are many millions of people around the world who have rumbled the evil-doers and feel helpless to counter their heinous impact. We are divided by circumstance – circumstance that the wrong-doers do all they can to exacerbate in order to maintain divisions by which they profit.
I think tony opmoc (above) has summed the syndrome really well. I never used to believe in old-fashioned, biblical stuff like ‘evil’ until I got assassinated by the Machine. How dreadfully I’ve learnt that it’s very real and very alive.
Let’s just pray that there are sufficient numbers of awake people in the UK to change all this in 3 months time. My most fervent prayer is that Cameron’s people are not infested with the same psychopathy. (From my contacts with senior people in that camp I’ve had reason to believe that there is indeed a more healthy, humane caucus driving the Tory party…)
Meanwhile, hang on in there. Easy to type and incredibly hard to do sometimes. Bless you for your honesty Craig, you’re not alone.
sam
@Tony, thanks for your views about changing one’s mind. I agree, people should regularly re-assess their moral perspectives.
@Sam: humane caucus driving the Tory party? – I’m not sure about that. My sense is that the selfishness and class warfare of Thatcher is, sadly, alive and well in them.
I just discovered this blog and am very impressed.
Mr Murray obviously has a skill with thinking.
The only thing that makes me uneasy is the use of the word “evil” to describe people.
Calling someone “evil” is often a warning sign that the person using the word ‘evil’ has their own relevant demons.